


Occultus Anquietas

by musesmistress



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-14
Updated: 2013-02-14
Packaged: 2017-11-29 06:44:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 31,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/684015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesmistress/pseuds/musesmistress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An off-world study of ancient artifacts reveals something new about Doctor Elizabeth Weir, the consequences of which; could change the shape of the whole galaxy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

John watched Elizabeth as she entered the gate room, the off-world vest on her shoulders, waiting to be zipped up. He never liked the idea of her going off-world because of the possibility that she would be hurt or captured by the locals – or worse, the Wraith.

He stepped up to her, taking in her relaxed features, yet slightly excited at the prospect of visiting a new world and meeting a new race, with strange new cultures and beliefs.

‘Are you sure you wanna go?’ he asked, causing her to look up from zipping up the vest. He loved the spark in her eyes that appeared when she felt defiant and out of control. It only ever lasted a moment, but it was definitely there. She liked his concern and loved it when he tried to talk her into reconsidering something.

‘Why wouldn’t I be sure, John?’ she asked, giving him a sly look that made him shift his stance.

‘Well, you know, there could be vicious animals, like lions,’ he said, giving her a fake horrified look.

‘And tigers?’ she replied, unable to hide the smile and chuckled as she added, ‘and bears? Oh my!’

‘Very funny,’ John smirked and looked over her shoulder as Ronon moved into the room. ‘Watch it, or I’ll have Ronon on your tail the whole time. You’ll be able to smell him with every movement you make.’

He turned his back to her and waited for the gate to dial. Major Lorne and his team were on the other side of the gate waiting for them, and he wanted nothing more than for this mission to be over already so he could get her back to safety— or at least relative safety. 

The gate opened; John nodded to his right to Teyla, who had been watching the exchange. He watched as she moved forward and stepped through the gate with Rodney before he moved on with Elizabeth at his side.

Stepping through the gate was always a fun experience for Elizabeth; it meant a new adventure, a new… everything, but she wasn’t prepared for the differences that this planet showed. Most planets visited by SG teams over the years since the beginning of the Stargate Project had similar properties: trees and planet life, a blue sky and wonderfully shaped landscapes.

This world seemed to be the exception to that rule. A strange pink and purple haze settled around her. It was instantly relaxing, to the point that Elizabeth didn’t feel quite as excited as she had moments before. The ground was saturated in a strange, dust-like sand that lifted under Major Lorne’s feet as he approached the team. The sand wasn’t yellow or even golden; it was black, a deep, dark, black that made Elizabeth consider how dark a night would be here. There were no trees or planet life within sight, and no visible structures or ruins.

‘Welcome to Vita,’ Lorne said, greeting Doctor Weir first. 

‘Vita?’ Elizabeth questioned, thinking the name was strange for so many reasons.

‘Yeah, the locals call this planet that, they live underground. Why, what’s wrong with Vita?’

‘Vita is Latin, for life,’ She narrowed her eyes at him before glancing at John and quirking an eyebrow.

‘So, where is this relic? I don’t have all day to stand around by the gate and inhale black sand,’ Rodney complained, kicking up some of the sand as he spoke.

‘This way,’ Lorne said, and he led the way from the gate.

It was an hour’s walk, which John, Ronon and Teyla did not mind. After about half an hour, Rodney began to complain about wasting his time and how they should have brought a jumper. Elizabeth ignored him completely. She looked around; attempting to spot anything that rose from the ground around her, but it seemed this planet was completely flat. She glanced up in the direction of the sun and was taken for a moment by its colour and shape. She had to look several times before she decided it was more of a hexagon than a ball, and it was purple.

Stopping, Teyla suddenly grabbed Elizabeth’s arm. Elizabeth swung around to question the Athosian woman, but Teyla nodded to the ground. Elizabeth looked down and found herself standing on the edge of a cliff; the dark sand had sunk away, and she hadn’t even noticed. Instinctively, Elizabeth stepped back and smiled at Teyla as a way of thanks.

‘Wow, that’s a… drop,’ John muttered, watching as Ronon leaned over the edge to look down.

‘The artefact is down there,’ Lorne informed them. ‘My team is down there waiting for us.’

‘How exactly do we get down there?’

‘That I think you’ll like,’ Lorne replied, looking down the cliff. ‘We didn’t believe it when we first saw it, but since, we’ve done it about 10 times each,’ he smiled back at Elizabeth. ‘Not afraid of heights are you, ma’am?’

‘No,’ Elizabeth replied and watched almost in horror as Lorne stepped off the end of the cliff. She stepped back to the edge, feeling Teyla’s hand again on her arm as she leaned over to see Lorne fall backwards down into the darkness.

‘Perfectly safe,’ Lorne’s voice said over the radio a moment later.

‘Nice!’ was all Ronon could say before he stepped off the cliff and followed the major. Teyla looked past Elizabeth at John, who was intently watching the very scared and shocked look that Elizabeth was fighting against. ‘Are you guys coming down or what?’ Ronon asked over the radio as he stood at the bottom. ‘You slow down the closer to the ground you get,’ he added, considering that at least one person up top might be thinking the jump was suicide.

‘Rodney, why don’t you and Teyla go ahead and… jump,’ John said. Elizabeth’s head snapped up to look at him, wondering if she’d heard him right— had he really just ordered two of his team to jump off a cliff.

‘What, are you insane? You want me to jump off a cliff? THAT’S SUICIDE!’ Rodney protested, but he didn’t get the chance to say anything else. Teyla had moved back from the cliff and had taken off at a running jump, taking the scientist with her. 

Taking several deep breaths didn’t help as Elizabeth listened to Rodney scream as he disappeared into the pitch black below. She vaguely heard his voice over the radio asking if he could come back and do it again.

John stepped up close but didn’t make any contact with her. He was still intently watching the expression on her face, and he briefly considered that she had lied to Lorne about being afraid of heights.

‘Elizabeth?’ he asked softly and turned his head to keep his eyes on her as she backed away from the edge.

‘I’m not afraid of heights,’ she breathed and looked into his eyes for a moment, and he felt his heart skip a beat at the fear he saw. ‘But I am afraid of falling.’

‘Lorne,’ John said into his radio. ‘Is there any other way down?’

‘No, sir— the way up is a one-way tunnel to the surface, but if you come down that way, you get ripped to pieces by some protective barrier.’

‘What about a jumper?’

‘Wouldn’t work on this planet. The ancient life signs detectors don’t work either.’

‘OK, show the others to the artefact, we’ll be down in a bit,’ John said, looking over at Elizabeth, who had backed off from the edge by quite a distance, her eyes still fixed on the edge of the cliff.

John moved to stand between her and the edge of the cliff, forcing her to look at him instead. He walked slowly forward and stopped right in front of her, with only an inch or two between them.

‘There’s no other way down,’ he whispered, not letting her break eye contact with him. ‘I won’t let anything hurt you,’ he said, still keeping his voice low and calming. He reached down and took hold of her hands and began to step back towards the drop point. ‘No harm, no danger, no pain,’ his heart was pounding in his chest; he wasn’t afraid of stepping off the end of the land and falling, but he was afraid that taking her with him before she realised what he was doing would be a big mistake.

‘Do you trust me, Elizabeth?’ he continued, not looking over his shoulder at the distance between him and the edge. He watched as she nodded, her eyes still fixed on his. She seemed lost in his eyes, and he mentally had to slap himself as the urge to reach in and kiss her moved across his heart, which was still thumping hard in his chest. ‘No harm, no danger, no pain; I promise,’ he said as he wrapped his arms around her waist and took the final step off the cliff, feeling the rush of air passing them as they fell backwards.

‘John!’ She protested as they left the drop point, but it was too late. She gripped him tightly, resting her head on his chest as they plummeted down.

They slowed, and John turned his head to one side, seeing the ground coming up towards his back. He felt it against his shoulders first, and his legs came to rest on the floor. He looked back at Elizabeth, whose eyes were squeezed shut and her breathing laboured as she remained unmoving. 

Teyla was the only one left in the area, which John was very thankful for as she moved towards them and rested a hand on Elizabeth’s back. Whispering that it was over, she helped Elizabeth to her feet and supported her for a moment as the doctor took in her surroundings.

They made their way through the underground cavern in silence until they spotted someone moving ahead. John glanced at Elizabeth and Teyla; then followed the person, with the two women close behind. The person had led them into a room that opened suddenly, glowing a strange shade of green mixed with red. The rest of the team were scattered through the room; in the centre of the room stood a podium that came up to Ronon’s waist as he stood next to it. On top was a small blue orb grasped in a black hand, with long fingers wrapped lightly around it.

‘Cool,’ John muttered as they looked around; he spotted a table that had been erected to his right. It was lined with finger foods and drinks for them, and a few local people were watching Rodney as he piled food onto a plate.

‘They do that to keep us comfortable while we’re here, they supply food; we give them answers on this stuff.’ Lorne said from his stance beside the door.

John nodded and turned to Elizabeth, whose eyes were looking around the room, and placed his hand carefully on her back. He led her to the table, picking up one of the cups of water and handed it to her.

‘Ah, so you finally made it down, that was kinda fun, I wouldn’t mind doing that again, how about you?’ Rodney said, stuffing a few oddly coloured cheeses into his mouth.

‘No thank you,’ Elizabeth said. ‘If I go back up, I’m not coming down again,’ She walked away and joined Teyla, who had moved over to the opposite side of the room to check out the carvings on the wall and talking with one of the natives.

‘Was it something I said?’ Rodney questioned as he watched her. ‘I thought she wasn’t scared of heights.’

‘She’s not, just falling from them,’ John said, giving Rodney a look that told the man clearly to let that information drop or else.

‘How exactly did you get her down here, then?’

‘A much friendlier version of what Teyla did to you,’ he said, feeling guilty for a moment about how he had pulled Elizabeth from the comfort of the surface to drop her down a pit. ‘Now, can we not talk about that again, ever?’

It was several hours later when Ronon approached the table and started collecting food. He didn’t notice Rodney stepping up beside him.

‘Strange choices, never pegged you as someone who would avoid meat,’ he said, noting that all the items on the plate were meat-free.

‘It’s not for me,’ he growled, moving away to pick up a cup of blue liquid and crossing the room. Rodney’s brow furrowed as Ronon offered the plate of food to Elizabeth and watched as she thanked him, taking the plate.

‘What’s with you?’ John asked as he began to load a plate for himself.

‘Did you know Elizabeth didn’t eat meat?’ Rodney questioned, picking up the last sausage-like thing before John could.

‘Yeah, thought everyone knew she was vegetarian,’ he said, smacking Rodney lightly on the back of the head and causing him to drop the sausage.

‘Thank you, I was gonna eat that.’

‘So was I,’ John smirked. He turned and watched as Elizabeth moved through the centre of the room to stop just past the pedestal. He put his plate down on the table instinctively as the orb on top flexed slightly, growing brighter, and then dimmer as she moved past it.

‘Whoa,’ one of Lorne’s team said, causing Elizabeth to stop and look at him. ‘Did you see that?’ he asked, looking around at another of his team, who nodded.

Elizabeth hadn’t noticed anything, as she had been interested in the drink Ronon had taken her at the time. She looked back at it with curiosity and took a single step forward. The orb flexed again, and Elizabeth stepped back.

‘We’ve all been near that thing, it’s never done that before,’ Lorne said, stopping just behind his leader.

The plate of food and drink still in her hand, Elizabeth took a few steps forward, watching the orb flex. Suddenly, a blue light emerged and engulfed Elizabeth for just a moment; then the radiance vanished, and the orb’s light went out completely. Her plate and cup clattered to the floor, but Elizabeth didn’t move. 

‘Are you ok?’ John asked, having reached her side instantly.

‘That was…’ She paused, searching for a moment for the right words. ‘The strangest thing I’ve ever felt.’

Over Elizabeth’s shoulder, John caught sight of the locals who had come and gone with food and drink and had offered what help they could. They were no longer standing and waiting for instruction; instead, they had moved to the ground, crouching, their hands joined ahead of them and heads bowed down between their arms.

‘I think it’s time to go back to Atlantis now,’ John took her arm and signalled to Lorne to stay and Ronon to head back with them. Before he managed to move her too far, Elizabeth looked back to see what had caught his attention: the people of Vita down on their knees to her.

~~**~~

‘She’s perfectly fine, Colonel,’ Carson announced as he entered Elizabeth’s office to speak with its sole occupant.

John was sitting in Elizabeth’s chair, absently fiddling with the silver watch that was curled on her desk by the computer. He barely looked up at Carson as he entered; he couldn’t believe so many things today, least of all letting some old orb thing attack her. There was no doubt in his mind, she was gonna hate him tomorrow.

‘She’s back in her room for the night. I sent a guard to make sure she didn’t sneak back here to do work,’ Carson laughed lightly at the thought, but stifled it when John didn’t join him. ‘Colonel, are you listening to me? She’s one hundred percent, just like she was when she left.’

‘I heard you,’ John murmured to the CMO. ‘She’s gonna hate me tomorrow for so many reasons.’

‘You can’t be blamed for what an artefact did, son. She knew the risks when she stepped through the gate.’

‘I’m supposed to protect her, Carson.’

‘Aye, and how exactly do you do that against something she’s studying?’

‘I should never have forced her to go down there.’ 

‘Excuse me, forced?’

‘The only way down there is to jump. The pit catches you before you hit the ground, but Elizabeth is afraid of falling, I kinda tricked her into jumping,’ John shook his head, ‘she’s gonna hate me enough for scaring the life out of her to begin with, let alone avoiding her while we were down there and making Ronon get her lunch,’ he mumbled something else on the end of this but Carson couldn’t hear it.

‘I doubt very much Elizabeth can hate anyone,’ Carson replied before standing up and moving to the door. ‘Leave it until morning, see how she is then. If you get the cold shoulder, then you were right— otherwise, I recommend carrying on like normal.’

~~**~~

The early morning gate glared brightly at John as he stepped down the stairs. Teyla emerged from the shimmering puddle, followed by Ronon and one of Lorne’s team, who had been injured. John dismissed the team member to the infirmary before turning back to Teyla and Ronon.

‘Anything new come up?’ he asked, looking between the two.

‘Nothing. The orb Elizabeth approached is powerless, according to Rodney. He believes she used the last of its energy,’ Teyla paused, considering her words carefully. ‘Did it do… anything to hurt her?’

John shook his head and began to wish he hadn’t; his head was beginning to pound. He hadn’t managed to get any sleep last night because of the question that had caused him to toss and turn: would Elizabeth ever talk to him again? He knew he was being paranoid and that she would have to talk to him. They had to work together after all— he was her second in command.

‘Not a thing, according to Beckett. He sent her back to her room, so I would assume today’s meeting will continue as scheduled,’ he told them as he led them up to the conference room.

It was over half an hour of sitting in the conference room together before anyone spoke regarding Elizabeth, who had not shown up for the meeting. Teyla offered to go to her room to see if there was a problem; John nodded, and she left.

~~**~~

Teyla approached the door to Elizabeth’s room and flicked her hand over the control crystals to sound the door chime. She waited, but Elizabeth did not respond to the chime. She tried again and waited patiently, thinking perhaps Elizabeth was in the bathroom or quickly getting dressed, having overslept.

After a few minutes without an answer, Teyla reached out to activate the door crystal so she could enter; however, she paused, considering the invasion of privacy if the Atlantis leader was not inside. She reached out, tapping the crystal, and the door opened easily for her. She took a careful step inside, looking around in the early morning light.

‘Elizabeth?’ The bed to the right was empty and looked as though its occupant had scrambled from it quickly. ‘Elizabeth?’ she said again and turned as she heard a small sob to her left. She froze in complete disbelief to what she was seeing.

To the left of the door, curled in a corner was a child, no more than seven years old and shaking with tears as Teyla looked down on her. The clothes she wore were many sizes too big and were just the type of clothing Teyla knew Elizabeth Weir wore to bed.

‘Elizabeth?’ Teyla whispered carefully in question to the small girl.

‘Where’s my mommy?’ Her small voice was higher than that of the adult Elizabeth, but, though slightly more chubby with her young age, her facial features were the same.

‘She is… preoccupied at present and has asked that I look after you for the day. I am Teyla,’ Teyla quickly made up this story as she crouched down in front of the girl. She smiled at her before slowly reaching out a hand. ‘I need to go visit a friend, would you like to come with me?’

Elizabeth reached out tentatively and took Teyla’s hand. She climbed to her feet, and the night dress fell down over her short legs to the floor. Teyla studied it for a moment, but decided the dress was not too big as to cause the girl any problems walking and did not hang provocatively off her shoulders as one would have expected from such a change in physical appearance.

‘We can find you something better to wear once we reach our destination,’ Teyla said, guiding Elizabeth to the door.

Out in the corridor, Teyla led Elizabeth to the transporter as she requested Colonel Sheppard meet her in the infirmary. She looked down at the girl, holding tightly to her hand and saw the familiar spark of curiosity as her head turned from left to right, looking at each thing and person they passed.

‘This is a hospital,’ Elizabeth said as they stepped into the infirmary. She watched for a moment as a nurse walked past. ‘Why are we at a hospital?’

‘My friend works here. He would very much like to meet you,’ Teyla said, spotting Carson across the room, talking to John.

John was sitting on one of the beds, looking worried. He was clearly unhappy about something, but not nearly as unhappy as he was going to become when Teyla reached them.

‘Colonel Sheppard, Doctor Beckett… I would like you to meet Elizabeth Weir,’ Teyla indicated the girl at her side, who had taken a step back as the Athosian carer had introduced them.

‘Oh crap,’ Carson voiced, and Elizabeth giggled.

John’s draw had dropped; he stood, staring down at the girl beside his teammate for a moment before he suddenly snapped back to action.

‘You told me she was fine,’ he said, his voice rising slightly as he voiced his displeasure at the situation to Carson.

‘Aye, she was. There was nothing in her blood work that could explain this.’

‘Teyla,’ Elizabeth said, the fear in her voice at the conversation.

Teyla turned to see the girl holding her arms up to her, wanting to be picked up. She reached down and pulled Elizabeth up into her arms, turning back to the conversation when she heard Elizabeth whisper into her ear.

‘I don’t think they like me.’

Teyla turned, moving away from the argument and over to a bed a fair distance from them. She sat the child on the bed and looked up over her head to where John and Carson where now watching her.

‘They are just… shocked. You are much younger than they expected,’ Teyla looked up again at Carson. ‘Doctor Beckett would like to make sure you are healthy, will you let him do that?’

‘Will it hurt? Last time I saw a doctor he stuck needles in my arm,’ she looked briefly as if she wanted to cry at the thought. ‘He didn’t even give me a lollypop,’ she added.

‘He will need to use only one needle,’ Teyla said, seeing Carson indicate “one” to her as he stepped closer. ‘If you are brave, I will find you a treat after he has finished.’

‘Chocolate?’

‘Yes, we can find chocolate, but you must be brave,’ Teyla enjoyed the gleam of happiness that grew across Elizabeth’s face at the thought of such a treat.

‘Teyla,’ John said, pulling Teyla away from Elizabeth and watching as the small girl grabbed Teyla by the arm.

‘I will not go far,’ the Athosian assured her, and moved away with John as she was released.

‘She’s a child,’ John said, stating the obvious as he looked over Teyla’s shoulder at the girl still sitting on the high bed. Carson had moved in to begin his examination of her.

‘I found her this way; she was crying and asking for her mother. I told her she had been left in my care for the day.’

‘So she’s not…’

‘Doctor Weir? No, she seems to have no recollection as to where she is, although she has yet to ask that question,’ Teyla looked back at the girl, who was listening to Carson’s heart beat through the stethoscope.

‘You gonna be okay looking after her today?’ John asked, not really believing he had asked that question. She was his leader and he was assigning a babysitter. Teyla nodded, and he continued.

‘We need to find out what that orb is. I’m gonna go back to that planet and fill McKay and Lorne in,’ he turned to walk away but paused for a moment. ‘Don’t let on to anyone that it’s Elizabeth. Try to avoid telling anyone her name.’

‘Of course,’ Teyla replied and moved back to Elizabeth’s bed.

~~**~~

John had made his way quickly from the gate to the cliff but had paused at the top looking down, his heart was pounding in his chest, the thought, the memory of how it felt to have Elizabeth clinging to him as they fell down to the ground below. If he looked past the hate he had of himself for walking her off the cliff to start with, he only came up with the racing heart beat that had sent a rush through him as he felt her fingers grip the strap of his vest and her nails grazing his shoulder.

He turned his back to the pit and stepped off backwards, feeling the same rush of air passing him but not enjoying the fall as much as he should have.

He climbed to his feet at the bottom and looked up. The bright purple sun was shining down with an unusual heat, and John suddenly remembered the haste and reason for his return.

Reaching the open room, John got the attention of Rodney and Lorne and pulled them separately over to a corner, away from the rest of the team and above all – away from the local people. Some of them were the same faces he had seen the day before bowing down to Elizabeth.

‘Hey, welcome back,’ Rodney said, looking over his shoulder at the items in the room. ‘This stuff is great, these things go way back, and by way back, I mean before the Ancients kind of way back. We’re talking—’

‘Elizabeth’s six years old right now, Rodney, so I couldn’t care less how old this stuff is,’ John interrupted.

‘Excuse me; did you say six years old?’ Rodney asked, sure John was making a joke, but confused by the serious and hurt look on the Colonel’s face.

‘Six, Rodney, it’s the number after five. She’s no longer an adult,’ John said, holding up the appropriate amount of fingers to go with what he said. ‘I need to know what that orb is and how to undo what it’s done to Elizabeth which means, until you can tell me the answers to those questions – you’re staying here McKay.’

‘Right, I might need more help with it, like a power source as it no longer has one,’ Rodney replied, the sarcasm still evident in his voice, but the power behind it depleted like the orb.

John turned away from Rodney. ‘Lorne, you and your team will run interference between McKay and the Gate. I’ll send Ronon back to help you. I don’t want that thing in Atlantis; if you work out how to fix this, then I’ll bring Elizabeth here.’

‘Yes sir.’

~~**~~

Elizabeth stepped cautiously around the corner into a room with people inside. She had been wandering the corridors of her new location for several minutes now, and she knew she would be in trouble when she found Teyla again, but her curiosity had gotten the better of her. She paused in the doorway, watching the three men inside. They were talking in a language she had never heard before, and it caught her attention straight away.

‘Hello,’ Radek said, having spotted a small girl standing in the doorway to his lab. ‘I don’t think you’re meant to be here,’ he said, smiling, all the while thinking of all the things this girl could break.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered, but didn’t move. ‘I lost Teyla,’ she said a little louder, hoping someone in the room knew who Teyla was.

Radek looked around to someone in the room, but they all looked as confused as he did. He reached up and activated his radio.

‘Teyla, I think you have a runaway,’ he said and watched the child as she dropped her head in shame and sniffed. He vaguely heard Teyla’s response before he stepped forward to the girl. ‘No, no, no, no, no, don’t cry, Teyla will be here soon.’ He had no idea how to stop a kid from crying, seeing as he generally avoided children all together; he was about as good with kids as Rodney McKay.

‘I didn’t mean to wander off,’ she said, her tears slipping down her delicate face. ‘I want my mommy.’

‘There you are,’ Teyla said cheerfully as she stepped into Radek’s lab. ‘I have been looking everywhere for you.’ She pulled Elizabeth up into her arms, thanked Radek and left quickly before anyone could ask who the girl was.

She carried Elizabeth down the corridor and into an empty room.

‘Please don’t cry, Elizabeth,’ Teyla soothed, reaching out to brush the tears from her face.

‘I want my mommy, I want to go home,’ Elizabeth sobbed as a fresh set of tears streaked down her chubby cheeks. ‘I don’t like it here.’

John’s voice interrupted Teyla as she was about to reply to Elizabeth. She reached up to activate her radio as John mentioned Radek’s lab.

‘Here they are!’ Ronon called down the corridor as he stepped into the room with Elizabeth and Teyla. ‘Why the tears?’ He asked Elizabeth and regretted it as she went back to crying after being intrigued by the people around her.

‘Earth children are not like Athosian children,’ Teyla said, a little exasperated. She had not had a very easy time with Elizabeth after taking her to Carson that morning; it was now early afternoon, and she had lost the six year old twice, had to shout at her once and inevitably made her cry, and now she was crying again.

‘Elizabeth,’ John said, thinking quickly about what he wanted to say. He couldn’t very well tell her to pull it together as he would have done if this was Doctor Weir. ‘Would you like to play with some other kids?’

‘I want my mommy,’ Elizabeth repeated, but stopped crying.

‘Your mom will be back in a day or two,’ he said and moved forward to the table she was sitting on. He reached out his arms and waited for Elizabeth to accept his offer to carry her. ‘Let’s go somewhere more interesting. Do you like to fly?’

‘Go on a plane?’ she asked, a small gleam of happiness poking back through the last of the tears as she let John pick her up. ‘In the air, over the land?’

‘It’s not exactly a plane,’ he said, leading Teyla and Ronon to the gate room. He needed to get Ronon back to Vita. ‘And there isn’t much land here, but we can go find some.’

‘Like exporers,’ the girl said, not getting the word out quite right. They stepped into a transporter, and John was about to touch the panel for their destination.

‘You wanna push it?’ he said to Elizabeth and caught Teyla’s raised eyebrow out the corner of his eye. ‘Right here,’ he said, pointing the gate room area on the screen.

Elizabeth reached out and touched the screen where he indicated, quickly retracting her hand to her chest as the doors closed. Her face broke into a grin; she had made the doors close and the strange elevator work.

‘Ronon, I need you to go back and help Lorne with trips between the gate and pit,’ John said, rounding the corner into the gate room and moving to the stairs. He had to adjust Elizabeth in his arms as she moved to look at the giant ring that stood on the far side of the room. ‘Withhold food from McKay until he has figured this out,’ he said, stopping at the top of the stairs and putting the girl down on the floor.

‘Elizabeth,’ he said quietly, crouching down and making sure he had her attention before he continued. ‘I need you to stay right here, sit on this top step and don’t move, okay? I’ll be right up there, and I’ll come back in just a minute.’

Elizabeth nodded and looked into the control room, craning her neck to see the strange panels and new people.

‘You want me to make that move?’ John asked, ticking the girl to make her look back at him.

‘It moves?’ she asked, looking at him a little afraid.

‘Well, it lights up, and then fills with water, sort of,’ he told her, then guided her to sit on the step. ‘Wait here; I’ll come back before it starts,’ he promised and followed the remainder of his team into the control room.

‘What are you going to do with her?’ Ronon asked as John finished giving instructions to the gate tech.

‘Keep her occupied until McKay can put her back to normal.’

‘And if he cannot?’ Teyla asked, unable to stop herself from asking the question.

‘I don’t wanna think about that,’ John said, a look of distaste on his face. ‘We’ll be on the mainland for a while. I’ll leave Major Cornwell in charge here,’ John told Ronon and moved with the pair back to the stairs.

John sat down on one side of Elizabeth while Teyla took the other side. Ronon moved down the stairs and waited at the bottom as the gate began to light up. Next to him, Elizabeth shifted uncomfortably and then jumped as the gate opened. Ronon turned and waved to them before stepping through the gate.

~~**~~

John juggled Elizabeth and her items in his arms. As he approached her door, he managed to free his hand and activate the control crystal so he could enter the room. He dropped the items and paintings she had done onto a chair and moved over to her bed, where he carefully laid the sleeping child down. She had been up all day, had exhausted herself before she’d even made it to the mainland, and then had spent hours playing with the young Athosian children, making daisy chains and finger paintings.

He tucked the covers tight around her, moving forward to kiss her forehead, and paused. His heartbeat sped up— what was he thinking? This he would love to do if the girl was, perhaps, his and Elizabeth’s daughter. But that wasn’t the case; this girl was Elizabeth, and he knew it would be very wrong to take this step.

Pulling away, John moved to the couch and made himself comfortable. This was clearly one of the strangest days he’d experienced in his life, and tomorrow, he’d have to start it all over again.

He drifted off to sleep, wondering just how long they could carry on like this before Elizabeth began asking for her mother again. He couldn’t kid himself— this girl was very smart for her age. There was no way they could keep her occupied like he had done this afternoon without her eventually realising they were lying to her about her mom.

‘John. John, wake up.’

It seemed like he had only fallen asleep moments before he was being shaken awake.

‘John, get up. What are you doing sleeping in here?’

‘Elizabeth?’ he questioned, not believing his eyes as he opened them to see Doctor Elizabeth Weir standing in front of him instead of the delicate six-year-old he had placed in her bed the night before.


	2. Chapter 2

Elizabeth's temper was rising quickly, she had been stuck in the infirmary for three long hours and not one person had told her what was going on, she had begun to fidget over an hour ago, the need to get out and do something else was becoming overwhelming and she tried her hardest not to wrap her fingers around Carson's neck and demand to know what was going on, as he took yet another blood sample.

It was a strange feeling, she couldn't explain it at all, the need to do, the need to move and take control, the urge to hit, to push and to strangle someone, it wasn't normal, it registered for a moment that she didn't feel quite like herself, but the thought vanished as soon as she saw John.

Sitting on the other side of the room atop an empty bed, John had sat watching her since they had entered the room; he hadn't let anyone know she had returned to normal, he wasn't completely convinced she had.

She caught his attention and held his gaze, the look in her eyes only too clear, she wanted to know right here, right now, what was going on. Carson moved away and Elizabeth hopped off the bed and moved towards him.

'Either you tell me what happened yesterday, or I'm gonna go find something to do besides being a lab rat,' she demanded momentarily shocked at her own manners, or lack there of.

'When I know what's going on, you'll be the first to know,' John told her, no sign of humour in his voice or on his face, but it didn't stop Elizabeth from becoming more frustrated than before. She set her jaw, making sure he knew she was unhappy with his answer; she turned and left the room.

Elizabeth wandered the corridors of Atlantis aimlessly, she avoided contact with as many members of her expedition as she possibly could, guessing that if John or Carson wanted to find her, the last person to see her would probably tell them where. Eventually Elizabeth came up with a thought, something she could do and keep out of the way, she turned the corner and disappeared into the transport, she turned back to the door after selecting her location and saw John round the corner behind her.

~~**~~

Teyla ducked as the marine she was training aimed his stick at her head, she moved quickly pulling out to the side and whacking him on the back; he staggered forward slightly and turned to face his opponent. They continued their fight, making attempts to hit each other and hearing only the sounds of their harsh breathing and the noise of wood on wood as their sticks collided.

Neither one of them noticed as a lone figure stepped into the room and stood at the side lines watching the sparring match. They turned again and the marine caught sight of the woman watching them and straightened up, quickly standing to attention for his commanding officer, even if she was a civilian he needed to give her just as much respect as he would give Colonel Sheppard.

Teyla took the moment of weakness and swept the marine's feet from under him and pinning him to the floor, she looked over her shoulder at Elizabeth and then turned back to her fighting partner.

'Not even for your commanding officers should you stop in the middle of a fight,' Teyla told him and pushed off to stand up, she offered him her hand and he pulled up and back to his stance of attention.

'At ease,' Elizabeth said and the man moved away to collect his belongings, leaving Elizabeth to approach Teyla.

'Doctor Weir,' Teyla had been a little surprised to see the woman instead of a child, but attempted to not show her shock. 'How are you?'

'Confused, I was hoping at least you would tell me what was going on; every one seems to be avoiding the issue. I'm sorry if I interrupted your session.'

'We were just finishing,' Teyla informed her as the marine nodded in respect and left the room. 'No one has told you of yesterday’s events?'

'No, they change the subject when I ask,' Elizabeth moved to the bench by the window and pulled off her jacket. 'Will you teach me?' She turned back to Teyla who raised an eye brow at her. 'To fight, I'd like to learn.'

'Would you not like to change?'

'I think I can manage,' Elizabeth said narrowing her eyes and moving into the centre of the room with the left over fighting sticks the marine had been using.

'Very well,' Teyla began and was suddenly knocked off her feet by an attack move that would have taken anyone down. She got to her feet as quickly as possible as Elizabeth began to move like an experienced warrior.

Elizabeth pinned Teyla down over an hour later, sweat glistening over their brows as Teyla struggled under the Atlantis leader. Elizabeth's knees were pressing into her thighs, a stick across her stomach and one against her throat, holding her almost completely still on the ground.

The fact that Elizabeth had won the battle after telling her she wanted to "learn" was surprising enough on its own, but the look on Elizabeth's face at the victory and the anger that pierced her delicate green eyes was what scared the Athosian woman the most.

'Doctor Weir,' Teyla said quietly hoping the woman above her would realise what she was doing and pull away, 'Doctor Weir,' she repeated a little more firmly and felt the pressure of the stick across her neck increase. 'Elizabeth,' she choked out quickly and then felt the items across her body shift.

'I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me,' Elizabeth apologised pulling up from the floor and offering her friend a hand up. It was at this point that she saw John again, standing in the doorway with Carson.

Carson's face was full of surprise, he had never seen Elizabeth in that light, no one had really, his mouth was hanging open, and it was obvious by the look on his face, that they had not just seen the end of the battle with Elizabeth pinning Teyla down, but they had seen some of the fight that had taken place.

John on the other hand was a little more composed, he was leaning against the door watching her intently; there was something about his demeanour that calmed her instantly.

She reached up and tucked her hair behind her ears and moved towards the man, her eyes searching his for any hint of what he was thinking, she couldn't find it, but the fact that he returned her gaze with a challenging one of his own made her blush slightly.

The people she had passed in the city, the people in the infirmary, even Teyla was no comfort to her, or enough to ease the edgy feeling that had shifted through her all morning, but John, he was a completely different thing all together. Under normal circumstances she would have been frustrated with his lack of emotion and words; it was hard to explain why she felt none of that frustration now, and for that matter why she felt none of the anger that she had shown in pinning Teyla to the ground only a moment ago.

'Please tell me what's going on,' she begged him quietly, not breaking eye contact with him. John looked over her shoulder to Teyla who stepped forward and began with a question.

'What is the last thing you remember?' Teyla asked as she guided Elizabeth to the bench and John stepped into the room allowing the door to close.

'The planet, Ronon brought me something to eat,' she paused thinking of what she had done that afternoon, 'I didn't like the drink, so I went to change it for something else, but stopped because the orb changed. I moved towards it and…' she trailed off, her memories ended there.

'You don't remember coming back here, to the infirmary?' Carson asked watching as Elizabeth dropped her head.

'I don't even remember walking back to the gate,' Elizabeth confessed looking between Carson and Teyla while avoiding John altogether.

'Ronon and I walked you back to the gate, I came back here with you and took you straight to the infirmary,' John started indicating Carson who should continue at this point.

'I did my usual post-mission check up and you were fine, you were talking to me as normal and even argued when I ordered you back to your room to rest for the night, I had to send someone with you to make sure you didn't go to your office to work,' Carson paused stealing a glance from Teyla. 'It wasn't until morning when we realised something wasn't quite right.'

'That's an understatement, Carson,' John interjected.

'You did not arrive for the morning’s meeting,' Teyla continued ignoring John's comment. 'I visited your room to make sure you were not ill but instead of finding you in the room…' Teyla halted; she didn't know how to tell her leader that she had reverted to a six year old over night.

'You were six,' John said seeing how Teyla was struggling and the room fell quiet.

~~**~~

Rodney cursed under his breath as he attempted to hook up a spare generator to the orb, but had trouble with the lack of entry points or power points in the device. He had taken to kicking the pedestal that it rested on top of and instead of helping him; it had inevitably caused him pain. Behind him, Ronon chuckled.

'Yes, thank you, it's very funny to see me in pain,' Rodney shot at him before turning his attention back to the pedestal which he had sat leaning against while nursing his bruised foot. He used it to pull slowly up but froze half way to stare at a carving at the top. 'Get me some light,' he shouted at anyone near enough to hear him.

Rodney snatched the light source from the young woman who had joined him, but she didn't move away, instead she looked over his shoulder at what he was looking at.

'Occultus Anquietas; Vita quod somes sub imperium,' she read out to him. Rodney turned so fast to look at her that he felt a muscle in his back pull, but ignored it.

'Say that again,' he demanded and waited as the girl repeated the two sentences.

'What does it mean?' Major Lorne asked having seen the sudden interest between the scientist and the girl.

'Hidden Ancient; Life and body under control; it's Ancient.'

'What does that mean?' Ronon voiced what Lorne was thinking.

'I don't know yet, but I remember Radek telling me about something he had found in the Ancient Database that referred to a hidden Ancient,' Rodney began clicking his fingers as his brain ticked over trying to remember what Doctor Zelenka had told him. 'Someone needs to go back and talk to Radek.'

'I'll go,' Ronon offered now sick of being stuck on a black and purple planet with the most annoying member of the team. 'I can tell Sheppard what's going on here too,' he added and moved away.

~~**~~

Carson and John had been reluctant to leave Elizabeth alone, considering what she had just learned had happened the day before she wasn't too bothered about the fact that one of the three of them would be with her until they worked this "situation" out.

It was John who was currently following Elizabeth down a dank corridor in an unexplored section of the city. He had originally asked where they were going, but Elizabeth had simply told him she didn't really know.

They turned another corner and Elizabeth stopped, she seemed to be getting her bearings for a moment before she moved forward a few paces and opened a door to their right.

John's Wraith stunner came up quickly; he had carried it feeling a little safer knowing that it would disable Elizabeth if anger took hold of her again. A thought he pushed away post haste.

He entered the room ahead of Elizabeth and found him self in a gymnasium of a style he had never encountered before, there was a large mat in the middle of the room and several pieces of equipment placed carefully at a distance around the edge of it.

Elizabeth moved past him and over to one of the pieces of equipment. It was long and thin and shaped much like the railings along balconies within the city. The Colonel watched her as she ran her hand delicately over the top of the railing before crouching down and untying her shoes, she kicked the boots off to one side and removed her socks and jacket before returning her hands to the equipment.

As confused as John was at watching the woman at the beam-like equipment, it was nothing to watching the slender leader push up on to the item, putting all the pressure on her hands and raising her legs up over her head and body to rest on the thin railing in a handstand.

Elizabeth parted her legs and placed a foot carefully to the bar beside her hands, without hesitation she used the leg to pivot off and back flip twice to one end of the beam. She gained her balance gracefully before looking over at John who looked completely put out by the skill she was displaying.

Elizabeth smiled playfully at him and hopped of the beam and made her way slowly to the mat as she watched him, she couldn't help but feel pleased with herself for shocking him so much at what she could do, earlier he had shown no sign of being shocked at her being able to fight, she considered that he believed her more capable of fighting than being so elegant and flexible.

'I haven't done gymnastics since I was twelve,' she tested the springs on the mat before doing a back flip again. 'I started when I was five, I convinced my parents by the time I was ten that I was going to be a cheerleader in high school.'

'Why'd you stop?' John said enjoying the moves Elizabeth was displaying for him.

'I don't remember,' she said pausing for a moment thinking hard about the reasons she had stopped. She gave up the thought and continued on the mat.

John sat down on a nearby bench and watched her, his mind wandering for a moment, there was undoubtedly a large time gap between her being able to do these moves as a twelve year old, and her being able to do them a fully grown adult, he was sure it was impossible that she could repeat these moves after such a gap, and he was very convinced that even if she could do them again, she would not be able to do them so perfectly.

It was a moment before John realised Elizabeth had stopped and was sitting on the end of the beam watching him.

'You were lost in thought for a moment, John,' she whispered and the look on her face at his contemplation made him tingle from head to toe, 'where you thinking about me?'

'Two days ago, I was worried that you'd never talk to me again,' he said after a short pause, 'I dragged you off that cliff, knowing it would scare you,' he confessed the guilt overshadowing the tingle. 'Now all I can think about is how that orb thing affected you, and how many ways I could have stopped you from getting closer to it.'

Elizabeth moved off the end of the beam and sat down next to him on the bench, she watched his face for a moment, noticing how he refused to look at her, and how his face tightened as she placed her hand carefully on his knee.

'I don't blame you for anything John; you did what you had to do to get me down there safely. If it hadn't been you there, I probably wouldn't have reached the bottom.'

John's head dropped to his chest, the thought occurring to him that if he'd just walked her back to the gate, none of this would be happening.

'John,' Elizabeth whispered reaching out to tilt his chin up and towards her, he moved his face out of her hands and looked away, but that didn't stop her, she moved off the bench to kneel in front of him and reached up to take his chin firmly in her fingers. 'I can't blame you for anything, you kept your word.'

John finally turned and looked at her, showing his confusion as he gazed into her soft green eyes, eyes that looked back into his own and he was sure she could read his thoughts. Things floating through his head that he would never, could never say aloud, like how much he wanted to kiss her on so many occasions and how he had longed to just reach out and touch her face when she looked sad or lonely.

'You promised me three things, "no harm, no danger, no pain," and you kept that promise,' she shifted closer to him and released her hold on his chin. 'I'm still alive and well, I'm not in any danger from enemies and Carson still can't find anything wrong with me, and I'm definitely not in any pain.'

John licked his lips, he remembered promising those things as he pulled her unwillingly off the edge of the cliff and he knew right there and then that he would forever be haunted by the look in her eyes as she had realised what he was doing, by the tone of her voice as she whispered his name in protest, and by his own words as he had convinced her to trust him just that little bit more.

He was suddenly very aware of how close Elizabeth was, on her knees now between his legs, he could feel her sides against his thighs, her chest against his own and her breath against his lips as she lingered dangerously close to kissing him.

'Colonel Sheppard, report to lab three, Colonel Sheppard to lab three, please,'

John pulled away as the voice called to him over the intercom of the city; he helped her to her feet and walked over to the beam to retrieve her shoes, socks and jacket. He wanted nothing more than to pretend that hadn't almost happened.

~~**~~

'Hidden Ancient,' Radek repeated what Ronon had said to him; he was searching his memory for something.

'McKay said something about Life and Body being controlled, as well,' Ronon added hoping to jog the scientist's memory.

'Still not remembering anything,' Radek said, straining his brain a little more. John and Elizabeth stepped into the lab at this moment.

'What's going on?' John asked and waited for someone to answer.

'Ronon was telling me about a carving on the pedestal back on P3S-949, he couldn't remember what it said in ancient but the translations were something like…'

'Hidden Ancient; life and body being controlled, or something like that,' Ronon told them.

'Occultus Anquietas; vita quod somes sub imperium,' Elizabeth said causing everyone in the room to turn and look at her. 'Kheita; vires ut antiquitas.'

'What?' Ronon said, raising an eyebrow at Elizabeth.

'Occultus Anquietas; Hidden Ancient; Vita quod somes sub imperium; Life and body under control.'

'That's what the pedestal said,' Ronon confirmed.

'Kheita, was the strength of the ancient people; she was said to have unimaginable strength and power, something in her genes that pushed the abilities her people had to new heights, she was born to the King and Queen, a miracle as they were both said to be barren,' Radek told them, remembering the story clearly now.

'She vowed on her deathbed that she would return to banish evil from their feeding grounds,' Elizabeth added, glancing at John momentarily before quoting the words said. '"On the day of my birth, thousands of years ahead, the one with my gene will receive my strength. She will complete the task I set; the banishment from life of all those who claim a feeding ground.".'

'The story tells of a pearl Kheita wore around her neck that expanded and glowed at the time of her death,' Radek pointed out, knowing everyone in the room would put two and two together to come up with the orb that Rodney was studying.

'So, you're the great, great, great, great, great, great…'

'John,' Elizabeth interrupted.

'Great granddaughter of this Kheita?' John said at last, but then added something that confused him, 'but you don't have the ancient gene and the gene therapy didn't work on you.'

Radek turned to his computer console and began searching for the story of Kheita again. He knew there was something he was forgetting. Elizabeth held John's gaze again making him sure she couldn't answer this question regarding the gene, but it was a silent communication he was convinced he had never had before and would never hold with anyone else.

'It says here that Kheita had an unusual version of the Ancient gene, they couldn't figure out why,' Radek said breaking the gaze between John and Elizabeth, 'there's information about her gene here, perhaps Doctor Beckett could work out something.'

'Send that info to Carson,' John ordered Radek and turned and left the room with Elizabeth ahead of him and Ronon following, 'lets go pay the good doctor a visit.'

'Sheppard,' Ronon said stopping the pair just outside the door to the lab, 'maybe we should test this "strength", and the abilities that come with it,' he glanced nervously at Elizabeth, considering that she would take insult from him asking John this instead of her.

'I don't think…'

'I think it's a good idea, Ronon,' Elizabeth said cutting John off, 'tell me when and where.'

'Elizabeth, I don't think this is a good idea,' John said turning back to her catching sight of her slipping her tongue out to lick at her lips and he forgot for a second what his argument was.

'I don't see what the problem is, I've never been in a physical fight before in my life and I managed to beat Teyla this morning, I believe I can take Ronon on too.'

'I'll be in the gym,' Ronon said and moved away from the pair.

~~**~~

Rodney pushed at a button at the very base of the pedestal, he had studied the object top to bottom and on all sides; he had been looking for more writing, but instead had found the button. He moved back quickly as several panels on the podium slid open, revealing the control crystals.

~~**~~

John had argued with her all the way to the infirmary and then for the whole hour she sat there while Carson did tests and took a DNA sample so he could run a comparison to Kheita.

It wasn't until Teyla came to take his place as Elizabeth's chaperone, that Elizabeth managed to convince him to let it happen, telling him that Teyla would be able to put a stop to anything and everything should it get too much.

She currently stood in the middle of the Gymnasium’s mat, she had led Teyla and Ronon here telling them that the springy mat would be safer for them and would be a much bigger space.

Ronon was currently thankful for this as he had just landed on his back on the floor in front of Elizabeth; she had thrown him with ease over her shoulder for the eighth time.

'I thought you two were going to give me a challenge,' she said, looking first down at Ronon, who had shut his eyes, then over at Teyla who was heaving herself up from the corner of the mat.

'We were going easy on you to begin with, just in case,' Teyla said moving forward towards her, 'I can see that it was not needed.'

Elizabeth smiled as she and Teyla pulled Ronon to his feet, it was a moment of steadying the unwilling man before Elizabeth looked up and her eyes met green eyes that looked longingly in her direction. She smiled at John, who stood with his arms crossed over his chest and his left shoulder holding his body up against the door frame.

Ronon moved away after spotting the gaze between them and pulled a few items from the bag he had brought with him, he stepped up behind Elizabeth and leaned carefully in to whisper in her ear.

'If you want a challenge,' he began holding something out to Teyla who took the item, with a raised eye brow, 'then sit down and let us tie your hands and feet.'

Elizabeth turned her head to look at Teyla, she was unable to turn and look at him, but seeing the intrigued look on Teyla's face was enough to get her to agree. She sat down on the mat and felt Ronon's rough hands pull her wrists behind her back and tying them with a piece of soft cloth.

Teyla moved forward and crouched down to tie a similar piece of material around Elizabeth's ankles. Elizabeth's eyes had returned to John, he looked slightly worried about what they were going to do, but at the same time, as though he were enjoying watching two members of his team tie her up.

They smiled at each other and John had the distinct feeling she was enjoying this as much as he was, and his enjoyment hitched up a notch as Ronon picked up a third piece of the material and draped it over Elizabeth head for a second before tying it tightly around her face, ensuring she would not see a thing.

Elizabeth heard, more than felt both Ronon and Teyla move away from her, feeling slightly trapped and alone frightened her, but she stilled the thought knowing what was coming. She heard the rustling of clothes from somewhere in the room and leaned back. She got comfortable, resting her fists on the mat behind her, her feet still stretched out in front of her and repositioned her hips and buttocks on the mat so she could move more easily when needed.

She turned her head to the right as someone passed close by, but as they moved away to the corner behind her she turned to face forward. Without warning someone behind her wrapped a strong arm across her shoulders, Elizabeth struggled forward, shifting the weight onto her hands, still tied behind her back and bent her legs up quickly and managed to sharply kick them in the face.

Ronon groaned and rolled back from her and almost instantly, Elizabeth felt pressure on her chest as someone pinned her by the shoulders to the floor, their hands contacted with her legs as she attempted to repeat the kicking motion, she knew the person sitting across her chest was Teyla, she could smell the faint aroma of mint tea that Elizabeth had introduced her to.

Teyla had her knees pinned to Elizabeth's shoulders her back to her legs, but she felt each shift Elizabeth made, but didn't notice that the woman had struggled enough to pull her hands out from under her body and was in the process of slipping them down her legs and over her feet. A swift blow of her hands to Teyla's back made Teyla lurch forward, placing her hands on the mat and freeing Elizabeth's shoulders.

Elizabeth shifted quickly, wiggling her body from under the woman before there was an opportunity to respond. She reached down and untied the first knot on the material around her ankles, she had no more time to pull the material away as an attacker appeared from her left and took a strong hold of her arms, she lurched her elbow in his direction and let the bone contact with the soft skin of male genitals.

Ronon groaned again, his hands releasing her as he fell to the ground and she quickly stood up, feeling the material on her ankle shift and loosen, she parted her feet and kicked the cloth away before stepping onto Ronon in the gut and move back over to were Teyla was last known to be.

Elizabeth turned to the sounds Ronon was making as he forced himself to his feet and moved quickly to her, his intention to capture her and pin her back to the ground thwarted as Elizabeth's right leg reached up and made a quick hard kick across his face. He hit the floor and Elizabeth dropped down over him, straddling his hips with her own.

Her hands on his chest, Elizabeth leaned in against the Satedan man and whispered seductively in his ear.

'I thought you were strong and over powering once upon a time,' she paused to make sure Teyla would not return to attack, 'it used to make me melt when you stood close, the thought of you over powering me,' she ground her hips against him and heard him growl. 'You're getting beat by a woman.'

Ronon kicked his legs up and wrapped them around Elizabeth's shoulders and used them to pin her to the ground, he heard her grunt as her back harshly hit the mat, he hooked his feet together, thinking she was now trapped, her own feet pinned to the mat under herself, but he had not seen how she had straddled him, she had not been on her knees as he had thought, she had merely lowered them from his view, her feet were free and she used them to kick Teyla in the gut as the woman had approached and then dig her heel into Ronon's gut while she slipped her hands under his feet and, with a strength that could easily have broken his ankles, push herself out from under him.

Elizabeth rolled over backwards to her feet and jumped to one side as hands reached for her, the strong hands grabbed her by the thighs and her trousers ripped, she reached one leg behind her and rolled to sit astride her attacker and raised her hands over her head ready to bring a blow down onto this person.

'Enough,' Teyla's voice was firm and demanding. 'I believe that we have proven a point here, the three of us cannot possible win, even if we all attacked at the same time, she is slender enough and flexible enough to free herself.'

'Three?' Elizabeth questioned and suddenly remembered that John had been standing in the door way, and the sound of clothes rustling, he had joined them between her being blind folded and the first attack.

Teyla removed the material from Elizabeth's hands and let the leader remove her own blindfold. She was still sat over her last attacker and looked down to see the familiar military issue trousers wrapped snugly around a pair of strong, firm legs. She peeked over her shoulder at John with a smile and considered for a moment if she could get away with staying here for a while.

'Elizabeth,' John breathed from under her and she realised that she was sitting on his stomach and cutting off the free movement that he needed to breathe, so she climbed off him.

~~**~~

Rodney pulled another of the crystals from the pedestal in the chamber on a planet some 80 years travel by Daedalus away and inserted the makeshift end of the power generator into the slot created; he had done this several times in the last few minutes with no response from the orb sat astride the item. This time however, when he plugged in the power devices, the orb lit up and filled the cavern with light.

~~**~~

John climbed to his feet and opened his mouth to apologies for ripping her trousers but froze, the pain on her face made his heart feel like it had stopped, her eyes closed and she squeezed them shut, something was clearly wrong.

'Elizabeth,' Teyla asked, having turned to see what was going on after helping Ronon up, she had taken one step forward when Elizabeth let out a scream, her arms crossing her chest at the pain, and for a brief second the three assembled people were confused as a flash of markings appeared to scroll quickly over her body and vanish.

John was the first to her side as she collapsed unconscious on the gym mat.

~~**~~

That evening, Elizabeth woke to find herself back in her own room, the lights low and the balcony door open allowing a small comfortable breeze to flow in from the night air. She looked around; expecting to find Ronon, Teyla or even John somewhere in her room, but no one seemed to be there.

As she climbed out of bed, she caught a movement to her right and turned slowly to see a figure standing out on her balcony. She picked up her robe and stepped out to join the person.

'Carson confirmed a match to the gene Kheita had, only not as an offspring,' John said hearing her feet pad out onto the terrace and stop short of him, 'your gene matches one hundred percent, apparently you are Kheita,' He said not making a move to turn and face her.

Elizabeth didn't answer or move forward to stand beside him; she simply pulled her robe on and wrapped her arms around herself. She noticed at this point that John's only item of clothing was his trousers; he had no t-shirt on and no shoes or socks.

'Teyla and Ronon believe you to be a prophet, they will probably keep their distance from you for a while, and I'm willing to bet that the Athosians will send you a few gifts,' John said and she could hear the bitterness in his voice, it made her shudder. 'Radek's still doing his research, he's not as convinced, like me, he's finding it hard to believe that our leader is a queen.'

'I'm not a queen,' Elizabeth took a single step forward, 'I'm afraid.'

John turned towards her now, his attention caught finally and he gazed through the darkness into her eyes.

'Afraid of what?' he asked his voice calmer now and with no trace of the bitterness he had shown before.

'I can feel a change in me, John,' she paused her fear spiking and she had to take a few deep and controlled breaths. 'I know this city, all the things in all the rooms, even in places we have yet to explore, that is how I knew where the gym was. I know this planet,' she paused again feeling a sudden wave of emotion cross her heart that was coming from him, 'on the land,' she stepped closer to him, 'under water, everywhere,' she took another step. 'I can feel where people are, what they are doing, if they are happy or angry,' she reached out her hand and rested it on his chest.

John shifted a little uncomfortable at her action, he didn't pull her hand away or leave the balcony to retrieve his shirt, nor did he speak to break the silence, he wanted her to do more than just touch him.

'I felt the strain on your heart when you saw me in the gym, on the beam,' she said her eyes lingering on her own had resting just shy of his stomach muscles. 'I felt you enter the room when Teyla and Ronon were putting me to the test,' her eyes slid up from her hand over his chest and broad shoulders to look him in the eye. 'I'm drawn to you, it's like you're my own personal magnet.'

Before John could react to the statement or even the movement, Elizabeth reached up and kissed him teasingly on the lips, she pulled back slightly and met his eyes with her own again and waited for his reaction.

John kissed her, reaching his hand around to rest on her back and pull her closer to him, her hand trapped to his chest as he backed her into her room, he broke the kiss to see where he dropped her robe and moved her to the bed, but once at his destination, he returned to the kiss as he lay her carefully down on the soft mattress.

~~**~~

'I don't get it at all,' Rodney complained staring down at the generator that was still plugged into the pedestal.

'What exactly did you do?' Major Lorne questioned for the tenth time that night.

'I told you,' he said annoyed, 'I went through the crystals one at a time, none of them did anything to turn the power on, but the last place seemed to overload it, the naquada generator is dead, just like the orb.'

'You killed the spare generator?' Lorne said wondering just how much trouble he would be in for this or if he could fob all the blame off onto McKay.

'I, excuse me? I. I didn't "kill" it; I got the thing to work didn't I?'

'For three seconds,' one of the Lorne's team called from across the room.

'I don't think this thing is ever going to work and there is no more information I can get from it,' Rodney said ignoring the comment. 'So unless these people have books or writings of some kind that could help me out here, I'm going back to Atlantis.'

Looking around, Rodney saw no movement from anyone, the locals where all standing watching him. The smug look he usually held when he was right about something was fixed on his face as he turned and picked up his things, forgetting the generator, and moved towards the tunnel up to the surface.


	3. Chapter 3

It was the early hours of the morning when John woke up; he was lying on his side in the bed with his front pressed up against Elizabeth’s back, his hand resting over Elizabeth's hip on to her stomach.

He lay still for a moment attempting to figure out what had woken him and taking in the wonderful smell of Elizabeth, he tightened his hand on her stomach and paused, confusion crossed John's face as he felt a small flutter of movement against his hand.

John moved his hand from its resting place and pushed the covers back to her hips, he stared, it was completely unbelievable, not to mention impossible; Elizabeth was pregnant.

He took several deep breaths and slowly pulled his other arm from under her head, and climbed from the bed. It was a moment before John moved from standing over her, looking down at the very gentle rise of her stomach and John was sure that if it hadn't frightened him so much, it would have made him fall in love with Elizabeth all over again; not that he had admitted out loud that he loved her yet.

He turned and grabbed his t-shirt and boxer shorts and padded into the bathroom, he stood at the sink for a moment staring into the mirror before splashing cold water onto his face and getting dressed.

Stepping back into the main room, John picked up Elizabeth's night dress from the chair by her bed and turned towards her. His eyes slid slowly down her body to rest back on her stomach and he relaxed slightly; Elizabeth had turned onto her back; her stomach was completely flat.

John pulled the dress over her head carefully and eased it down her body. He paused to kiss her cheek before gliding the covers up to her chin and moving to lie on the couch as he had done the previous night.  
~~**~~

Rodney stomped down the dark passageway of the underground cavern very aware of how alone he was, not to mention how little he knew about this corridor and planet. He stopped sudden and his face fell, he cursed and slumped against the wall.

'Oh that’s just great. Why do people never tell you which way to go when you come to a new planet?' he groaned. 'Lorne,' he said into his radio, 'which way’s out?'

Rodney was greeted by static back over the radio and turned it off, he looked back at the split in the tunnel, each turning was as purple as the other, and neither looked as though they would lead up to the surface. Rodney took a deep breath and continued to the right.

It was a while of walking before Rodney realised he was not getting any closer to the surface and he looked back over his shoulder to check if the passage had been a very gentle slope; it had not. He paused looking in both directions down the tunnel and just as he was about to move back the way he came, a small, low hum started not far from his location.

Curiosity kicked in and Rodney carried on towards the humming, which stopped as he stepped into a small room. The walls of the room he stood in, were glowing in the same purple light that the sun let out, but on the smooth black walls, clearly visible through the glow, was ancient writing.

Rodney dropped his bag and pulled out his camera, he videoed the walls carefully, making sure to catch all of the writing clearly before grabbing his bag and taking off back down the tunnel at a run.  
~~**~~

A cool breeze drifted over John as he pulled slowly from his dream, he could hear a voice, but it sounded distant and unfamiliar, he opened his eyes to look around, the strange room was scarcely filled with items, but what caught his eye was the red t-shirt that was draped over a chair. Suddenly, as if someone had slapped him sharply on the face, the memories of the previous night came rushing back.

Making love to Elizabeth Weir, waking in the middle of the night to find her pregnant, and pulling on her night gown moments later when she was back to normal, before falling asleep on the couch.

John listened to the small voice that floated around the room as it sang the song; he pulled up from the couch and moved toward the open balcony door as the song ended and then restarted.

'You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skies are grey, you'll never know dear, how much I love you, please don't take my sunshine away,' six year old Elizabeth stood looking out over the vast sea that surrounded the city, her small hands holding tight to the railing as she repeated the song again.

'Hey,' John said softly after the verse was finished again, Elizabeth turned to look at him and smiled.

'Did I wake you?' She questioned hoping her smile would push in her favour.

'No,' John moved to kneel on the floor beside her, 'but don't you know the rest of the song?' He watched as Elizabeth shook her head.

'My mommy used to sing it to me before bed; I think I was asleep before she sang more,' she looked down between the bars of the balcony and John had a momentary lapse of fear that she would start crying. 'When's my mommy coming back?' her voice was small and sad, and it broke John's heart to hear it.

He reached out and wrapped his arms around her pulling her quickly into his arms and lifting her from the ground, she giggled at him as he moved back into the room swinging her around as he moved.

'Soon,' John replied dropping the girl on the bed and moving to the chair, he picked up the small clothes and turned back to her before taking aim and flinging the clothes at her so they landed on top of her; her laughter was uplifting. 'Let's see who can get dressed fastest, me or you,' he said and grabbed his trousers from another chair.

Elizabeth was struggling off the bed and out of her night dress before John reached the bathroom. But it didn't matter to him; he had no idea what to do with a six year old leader.  
~~**~~

Rodney had run from the text filled room, through the tunnels of the strange world and up to the surface, where he had found himself in sight of the Stargate. He didn't stop there, not even for a break; he took off across the black land and hastily punched in the address to Atlantis.  
~~**~~

'There has to be a reason for it,' Carson said from his place at the conference table, he was sat looking between John, who sat opposite him, and Teyla, who sat next to the six year old Elizabeth at the furthest point of the room. 'A trigger; or event that changes her like… this.'

'I'm open for suggestions,' John said watching Elizabeth as she changed crayons and continued humming as she drew her picture.

'It's Tuesday,' the small girl interrupted suddenly, 'I do gym class on Tuesday, can I go?' Elizabeth directed her question at Teyla, who in turn looked over to John.

'We'll sort something out later, Elizabeth,' he told her and waited as she nodded and returned to her drawing.

'There are too many questions, and not enough answers,' Carson said glumly. 'Why and how does she revert to a child?'

'How does she know to fight better than anyone I have met?' Teyla added, 'not to mention her gymnastic ability, those are the things we have witnessed so far.'

'You missed one,' John said pausing to take a deep breath, 'I woke in the night, and she was…' John said the word, but mumbled it.

'Excuse me,' Carson said, he had caught the word, but wasn't completely sure he had caught the right word.

'She was pregnant,' John said a little louder, ‘it only lasted a few minutes, that I saw,' he added looking down at the table.

'Six years old! Pregnant! Warrior princess! Professional gymnast! What next?' Carson's exasperation at the situation was showing in the tone of his voice.

At this point, Elizabeth picked up her drawing and was showing it off to each of the people sitting at the table with a big smile on her face. The drawing was the standard six year old style, the green grass, blue sky and bright yellow sun, but the person she had drawn in the centre of the page was what caught their attention.

Elizabeth had drawn a perfect picture of Doctor Elizabeth Weir, the details were amazing for her age, her hair, eyes, uniform and even the way she stood were drawn perfectly; and to top it off, her skin was marked, a marking John and Teyla had seen after the training session, when their warrior princess of a leader had collapsed in pain.

Before any of them could respond to the drawing, the Stargate dialled and the wormhole opened. It took John a moment to react, and he eventually stood up and moved out of the conference room to see what was going on.

Down below in the gate room, Rodney emerged from the water-like substance of the Stargate and began babbling to Radek, who had gone down the stairs to greet him. John watched as Radek pointed in his direction and Rodney took off up the stairs towards the conference room.

John stepped back into the familiarity of the conference room and fixed his eyes on the picture, that Elizabeth had lay back on the table; she was busy drawing again and had returned to humming as she did so.

'Wow,' Rodney said as he stepped breathlessly into the room behind him, 'is that Elizabeth?' he asked and eyed the girl across the room as she watched him. 'That's great, just what we need, a kid to break things.'

Elizabeth dropped her crayon to the table and hung her head at his comment, she had in fact broken something that morning in the infirmary, she was sure she would receive punishment for it as well as feeling guilty for the act. 

'Rodney,' John said warningly to the scientist. 'I thought I told you not to come back until you could put this right.'

'Well I don't think changing this situation is possible, but I do know how it can be controlled, I think.'

'You think?' Teyla questioned, picking Elizabeth up as she spoke and pulling the new picture and crayons over to show the girl she could carry on drawing.

'Yes, well, gibberish on the pedestal and a room filled with text I haven't translated yet is hardly anything concrete.'

'What room,' Carson questioned before Rodney could babble anymore.

There was a moment of distraction as Teyla began bouncing the knee that Elizabeth was sitting on causing the small girl to giggle, and all three men suddenly realised that Elizabeth was still there. Behind them, Ronon had stepped into the room.

Silence fell around the adults, but Elizabeth's giggles still pieced the air, high pitched and innocent as she was bounced by Teyla and attempted to draw.

'Teyla,' John started seeing Ronon out the corner of his eye, 'maybe you and Ronon could take Elizabeth to the gym.'

Elizabeth dropped the crayon on the table, her eyes wide with joy as she looked at John. Ronon moved around the table towards her and Teyla. Without warning, he reached down, picked her up and slung her loosely over his shoulder. Elizabeth’s laughter rang through the air as Ronon pushed her further over his shoulder so all he had was her ankles in his hand and she dangled down his back.  
~~**~~

Rodney explained, at top speed, about his trip back to the gate, how he had come across the room along the way, he told them of the video of the black walls, and how he had made sure to capture everything for later translating.

John and Carson had, in return, explained the events that Rodney had missed, telling him about the story Radek had read, the gene Elizabeth had and all the changes they had witnessed in their leader.

Rodney at this moment in time; sat staring at the computer screen, which housed the images he had taken, he was translating the text in his head, which he knew was a bad idea; he should have stopped at his room to collect his pocket pc, and used it to make notes.

Ronon and Teyla hadn't made it to gym with Elizabeth, Ronon had placed the small leader back on her feet in one of the corridors and watched as she ran ahead and around a corner, but once they turned the corner, they hadn't found the child, but the doctor that was in charge of the expedition.

Confused about what was going on, Elizabeth had agreed to go with them to the infirmary and the two of them were currently explaining to Elizabeth what had happened while Carson was doing more tests.

Major Lorne had brought his team back, they had stepped through the gate less than two hours after Rodney had returned and John had told them to forego the meeting and go straight for the written report.

John was sat back in Elizabeth’s office, his eyes deceptively fixed on the tablet PC she had on her desk as if he was reading a report, but he was doing no such thing as the PC wasn't even turned on. Instead, John was thinking about the events of last night, what Elizabeth had said she felt, "I know this city, all the things in all the rooms," the words had echoed in his head for almost an hour, he still didn't understand what it meant, but more daunting than these words, where those she had said before she kissed him, "I'm drawn to you, it's like you're my own personal magnet."

It scared him a little, what had she meant by it, was there a connection? Or were they destined to be together? Either way, John hoped that feeling would last and that one day he could return it with more than just a speeding heart beat when he was near her and the wish to hold her close.

He hadn't told anyone what had taken place between them last night, he didn't mention that they had slept together with no birth control to protect her, and he didn't really want to point out, that it was possible, that her body had changed to reflect something that was actually happening, if not simply playing on her mind.

This fact didn't scare him, he would be pleased to learn Elizabeth was carrying his child, the situation was a little scary, but what kept his mind working at the moment, was the reason Elizabeth was drawn to him.

'Colonel,' Elizabeth had stepped back into her office with Teyla close behind her. John didn't look up; his mind was still working the information over and over. 'Colonel,' she repeated slightly louder than the previous time. She moved forwards and took a seat in front of her desk, reversing the roles of herself and John Sheppard.

'I thought that was my seat,' John said after recovering from the shock of seeing her back to normal, or close enough for the moment.

'Normally, yes, but you're already sitting in my seat, deep in thought, so I sat down here instead.'

John smiled at her, his features more relaxed at seeing her as he had seen her before drifting off to sleep; an adult.  
~~**~~

Two days past, in which time John had spent as little time as possible with Elizabeth, instead he made sure Teyla, Ronon and Major Lorne shadowed her. Followed them on occasion to the gym where he watched as she used the equipment as if they were old acquaintances; or trained with Teyla or Ronon.

He slipped into the Gym behind her one morning and silently released Lorne who was sat watching Elizabeth on the Gym’s mat wearing a blindfold Teyla and Ronon had left behind. He watched as she performed a complicated set of tumbles and landed firmly on her feet for a second before making another two moves to end in the centre of the mat.

She waited there, aware that her guard had changed, and waited as this new person took off their boots and jacket and moved to the middle of the mat. She had initially thought her new companion was Ronon, but as he stepped onto the mat a familiar sensation washed through her and she relaxed into the tingling feeling that buzzed through her new ancient Gene.

Not shockingly Elizabeth had felt the resonance of this gene several times since this whole thing had started, everything from Rodney’s ATA gene therapy to Carson low yet real version, but none of them felt as comfortable or complete as that of Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. Days ago, while fighting Ronon and Teyla she had been too wrapped up with sensing Ronon’s Satedan blood and fixing on the Wraith DNA in Teyla to realise that John had joined the fight.

Now though, there was no mistaking it, if he got close enough to her, she could tell he was there, and the closer he was, the more breath taking the sensation was.

John stepped quietly up behind her thinking she knew someone was coming, but not knowing who, and he reached around and rested his hand just in front of her face, waiting.

‘I could do a lot with that hand, John,’ she told him but didn’t move, John waited, still silent.

Elizabeth reached up quickly and pulled John easily over her shoulder to land flat on his back on the mat ahead of her, without waiting she moved around to his side and dropped down over him her legs straddling him and her chest pressed against his.

A sudden fear washed through John and he moved quickly flipping them and climbing from the mat, he grabbed his boots and jacket and darted out of the room without looking back.

Elizabeth was on an adrenalin rush for most of the time, she could still feel the changes taking place, and her head rang with all the things she knew were possible, all the places in the city or on the main land she wanted to go, she had taken to sitting on the end of one of the piers as she was told by John, in one of his short passing moods, that she couldn't be in charge until this was sorted; she had found no way to argue with him and had given in.

Sitting on the end of the west pier as she was at the moment, she watched the water below her, and focused on one of the possible elements that she felt with her changing body. She fixed her eyes on the water below her and concentrated.

Ronon was stood to her right, leaning against what could only be described as a lamp post, he watched intently as the water below Elizabeth’s feet began to shift, pushing away from the side of the city and began to swirl in circles.

'Doctor Weir,' the Lieutenant from Teyla's training session a few days back had approached her, he was still nervous around her and watched as the water suddenly cascaded back to the city and slashed up at the woman's feet and legs. 'I'm sorry to interrupt, but Colonel Sheppard has requested you for a meeting in the conference room.'

'Thank you Lieutenant,' she said before reaching out to Ronon who was offering to help her up.

When they reached the conference room, they found not only John in the room, but Carson, Rodney, Radek and Teyla. Elizabeth took her usual seat and looked around at the assembled people.

'OK,' John said from her left and looked around the table, once again avoiding eye contact with her. 'Rodney thinks he has come up with an explanation for the small changes.'

'Small?' Elizabeth questioned raising an eyebrow at him, 'I know six years old is small, but the change is far from it.’

'Excuse me?' Radek said, he knew he was here regarding the orb and the story, but still had not been told of what was actually going on, 'six years old?' he repeated then turned to Teyla, 'the girl, that was in the lab, that was…'

'Yes,' Teyla confirmed, 'that was Elizabeth.'

Radek muttered in Czech and was shocked when Elizabeth let out a small chuckle at him.

'Yes, well, right then,' Rodney started drawing everyone's attention to him, 'the room I found on my way back was interesting, but basically told the story of Kheita, the ancient with an advanced gene, who promised to send her reincarnated self back to destroy the evil Wraith,' he paused for effect but didn't realise that everyone around the table already knew the story. 'Anyway, it also mentions details of changes that Kheita went through when they discovered the difference in her, how she used to revert back to the past and managed to manipulate things around her.'

A glass of water from the centre of the table shifted across towards Elizabeth and the eyes of everyone around the table followed it to her, a mix of confusion and admiration on their faces as she, without taking notice of them, lifted the glass to take a sip.

'Anyway,' Rodney continued as Elizabeth placed the glass back on the table, 'it said that things she talked about before she was fully relaxed was what changed her most, and that she never got rid of the problem, but learned to control it.'

'That doesn't really explain the six-year old session, or two,' John said watching as Elizabeth once again raised her glass to drink.

'Well, what did you talk about on your way back to Atlantis after the orb did its thing?' Rodney questioned, having been absent for the journey.

'Kids,' Ronon said pointedly.

'We passed the settlements viewing window,' John started, and paused to look around them, 'Elizabeth pointed out that there were no children in the city below.'

'Well that explains that, what about the other stuff?'

'She was following her instinct to the gym, I guess that part came with finding the room,' John said.

'Elizabeth was frustrated with not being told what was happening,' Teyla added, 'I believe it drove her to fend for herself.'

'Which pushed her to put up a fight,' Ronon confirmed.

'OK,' Carson said running through all the things Elizabeth had managed to do and all the changes she had experienced. 'What about the pregnancy? And why did she go back to being six the second time?'

John's head dropped, he knew the answer to that particular question; to both of them if he thought about it long enough. He just didn't want to answer.

‘That kind of conversation may have come up in my last meeting with Doctor Heightmeyer,’ Elizabeth replied and John wondered if she was lying about it or if she had actually had a conversation in a therapy session about being pregnant and changing to a six year old.

‘Right, well, anyway,’ Rodney stuttered a little taken back by the reply, ‘as I said, the wall mentioned no way to stop the changes, just that Kheita learned to control it, so it stands to reason that when this gene has settled in Elizabeth, she’ll learn to control it.’

‘Is there someway we could help?’ Ronon asked lazily leaning back in his chair as he listened to the conversations.

‘How exactly?’ John asked his friend.

‘That’s why I was asking.’

‘If there is no way to undo this,’ Carson said with an apathetic tone, ‘then perhaps just encouraging control would help, the more Elizabeth uses these abilities, the more she can control them.’

‘Well it was either control or a fluke that the glass moved,’ Rodney pointed out.

John watched as Elizabeth eyed the glass not realising she hadn’t actually reached out for it, she pushed it out into the middle of the table again and sat back, her eyes fixed on it and everyone else’s eyes fixed on her.

Again, without having to think too hard about it, the glass slid across the table to rest in front of her, a small smile on her face she looked back at the two glasses still waiting in the centre of the table. Both items shifted simultaneously, one going towards Teyla, the other to Ronon, who reached out and took it, thanked Elizabeth and downed the liquid in one go.

‘OK,’ John said with a small amount of worry, ‘encouragement it is.’

~~**~~

John wanted to run, hide, escape, he was still avoiding Elizabeth like there was no tomorrow, but it seemed he had run out of hiding places. 

Ronon was sleeping off the night shift with Elizabeth, Teyla and Carson were needed on the main land and Lorne had a mission to get to, that only left him and Rodney who could watch out for her, and Rodney was refusing to look after the “accidental six year old”.

He stepped up to the door and hesitated before motioning over the panel; the door opened and he stepped in and nodded to Teyla, who left the room quickly.

He moved to sit down while he waited for Elizabeth, who was in the shower, but never got to sit down.

‘Hello John,’ she greeted him from the doorway to the bathroom. ‘You’ve been avoiding me.’

John couldn’t help but listen, her voice was mysterious, as if she was reading his mind, gathering the thoughts he had before entering her room.

‘I’ve been busy.’

‘You’re lying,’ Elizabeth said sitting down on the bed wrapped only in a towel. ‘What are you afraid of John?’

‘What did you mean by "I know this city, all the things in all the rooms"’ he asked her finally sitting in the chair opposite her.

‘I don’t know, I can feel things, sense them if you will.’

‘Like what?’

‘I was drawn to the gym,’ she said looking away and fiddling with the outfit Teyla had set out on her bed for her, ‘I’ve been wanting to go somewhere else, lately I’ve felt this pull to go to the bottom of the control tower and…’ she faded off, she couldn’t explain the feeling, the sensation that coursed through her veins.

‘So get dressed,’ John said to her and watched as she looked up at him in shock. ‘We agreed to encouragement, right?’ she nodded at him, ‘So lets encourage that… notion.’

Down at the base of the tallest tower, Elizabeth looked around, the room they stood in was a hub for activity, three doors leading to other parts of the city, a door to a transporter and a set of stairs that John was currently sitting on.

Something was missing, she could feel it, and she moved to stand against the wall by the stairs.

‘Why did you lie?’ John asked after a few minutes. ‘In the conference room, when they asked what triggered the pregnancy and second bout of six-year-old-ness.’

‘What makes you think I did lie?’

‘At the time, I thought it was true, but shortly after the meeting, I realised you never had a meeting with Heightmeyer that day.’ He glanced over at her and saw the smile break out on her lips, he would have given anything at that moment to reach over and kiss her, but he couldn’t.

‘Would you rather I told them what we did?’ she asked coyly, ‘tell them that unprotected sex made me drift off to sleep considering that it would make me pregnant and then start wondering what it would be like to have a child in Atlantis?’

‘Not really,’ John replied and watched as Elizabeth pushed off from the wall and walked towards him.

‘Do you regret it, John, being with me?’

He watched her for a moment choosing his words carefully, he didn’t regret it, it was the best thing he’d done since he met her, but he couldn’t let it happen again; their jobs depended on that. He had lusted after her to begin with, wanted her, but pushed all his emotions deep down until he could practically stand on them.

But now it was different, he was falling in love with her, and his job was the only thing that was keeping him close to her right now, and that was something he didn’t want to lose.

The SGC themselves were unsure how to deal with the current situation, their last report was received two days ago, and he was sure that at this very moment, anyone who had some form of control over the Atlantis expedition was pulling the information apart, piece by little piece.

‘I don’t think I could ever regret something like that, with someone as beautiful as you,’ he said watching her smile with a small blush, ‘but we need to be careful,’ he reached out and ran his fingers along her jaw gently, ‘I don’t want to lose you.’

Elizabeth leaned in and kissed him gently the barest of touches, just brushing lightly over his lips, she pulled back to see his reaction before she asked again a question he had avoided earlier.

‘Why have you been avoiding me?’

‘I’ve done so many things to hurt you over the last few days,’ he said quietly, ‘I don’t want to do anymore.’

‘You’ve never hurt me John, you promised me, and you’ve kept that promise.’

John smiled, watching her for a few minutes more, her eyes sparkling at him, the way she licked her lips, the pressure of her hands as she rested them on his knees. He caught himself before the need to kiss her again took over and broke the silence.

‘So, what are we looking for down here?’

‘There’s another door,’ she told him looking away with a pleased smile at their conversation, ‘I just don’t know where.’

‘Come here,’ he said and pulled her to the centre of the room, ‘close your eyes,’ he instructed and released her hands, ‘now concentrate on the room and guide me to the door.’ John moved away and approached a wall. Watching her, he began a slow path around the area, waiting as she located the room she was drawn to, he figured she’d tell him where to go when she found it.

He walked several times around the space they were in, waiting for her to focus on what she was feeling, as he passed the stairs again she spoke suddenly, making him jump slightly.

‘Stop.’

He froze where he was and looked at her; she was still in the centre of the room where he had placed her, her hands at her sides and her back to him. She turned to look at him, her eyes meeting his for a moment before she looked at the wall behind him; she had leaned on it moments ago as they talked.

‘It’s here,’ she said walking towards him, ‘its right here.’ She passed him and placed both hands on the wall and copied her action.

‘Concentrate,’ he told her, ‘open the door, Elizabeth.’

She closed her eyes again and focused on the invisible door, in front of his eyes, the wall began to change, becoming translucent before vanishing completely, his hand fell through the air and he staggered to keep himself upright.

Just inside the room, John looked around and was greeted with nothing but darkness, he could see the outline of something ahead of him, but couldn’t work out what the shape was, or even if it was the only thing in the room.

Elizabeth stepped up close to him and he heard her mutter a word in Ancient before the room was flooded in light.

‘Wow!’ John breathed, he couldn’t believe what he was seeing, the sight was astonishing, the room was massive and it was filled with something he never thought he’d see again.


	4. Chapter 4

‘Why me?’ Elizabeth asked from behind John before he could take another step into the room.

‘Why you, what?’ John asked turning his back on the room and looking at her, her face was turned away from him and she looked as though she wanted to cry. ‘Elizabeth,’ he asked tilting her face up to look at him.

‘Why did this gene have to be in me?’ she asked and stole a glance over his shoulder at the room’s content. ‘I don’t think I can actually handle this.’

It was a huge contrast to what she was like a moment ago, as if her hormones had just taken an abrupt u-turn and she was now facing the other way. He wouldn’t deny that it hurt to see her go from pleased with herself for finding this place, for being with him, to being suddenly self-conscious and completely afraid of what was going on.

‘Carson said you had the gene from the day you were born,’ he said running his thumb gently across her jaw, ‘he said it was just lucky.’

‘I don’t feel lucky, I feel everything but lucky… literally,’ she said and attempted a smile. ‘I know what I need to do, and I know how, but I don’t know if I can actually go through with it, John, one wrong move, one stray thought and I could end everything.’

‘The Wraith,’ he said pulling her close to his body and wrapping his arms around her, ‘are evil, life sucking aliens, worse than vampires,’ he felt her chuckle against his chest, ‘I would rather be dead than let them carry on feeding off innocent people. Wouldn’t you?’

She nodded against him and then pulled back too look up at him, before leaning carefully in and kissing him passionately.

‘Now,’ he said pulling back from her, ‘come and show me what’s in this room.’

~~**~~

‘You wanted to see me?’ Radek said stepping into the lab and approaching Rodney.

‘Yes, yes, yes, hang on,’ Rodney mumbled, his eyes glued to the screen, his fingers tapping against the desk. ‘I can’t make sense of it,’ he said at last. ‘This section of the wall; is separated from the rest,’ he indicated the section of the full wall to Radek. ‘The first section is all about Kheita, her story, her changes all of that nonsense; but this section is in a completely different style, tells of how she will destroy the Wraith, apparently there are hidden weapons, drones that have more power than the standard ones and ZPM’s that last longer.’

‘Right, so what’s the problem?’

‘Down here,’ he pointed to the lower section of the wall, ‘tells of possible ways for her to fail, everything from not being able to control the changes, to leaving the city and not even trying, but there’s a part here that says “to guarantee victory, she must have…” something, I can’t translate it, its just meaningless nonsense like the rest of the wall.’

Rodney got up from the chair and moved to stand and look at the blown up version on a larger screen in the lab. Radek moved to sit in front of the screen and began working on the translation.

~~**~~

‘Drones, ZPM’s, Hand held weapons, rifles… we’re in a weapons locker,’ John said picking up a small flat circular object and examining the display screen.

‘Big weapons locker,’ Elizabeth said from nearby as she picked up the hand held gun and clicked on a button with her thumb. It hummed to life and John turned in time to see her aim the gun at a distant wall and pulled the trigger; it emitted a blast of energy that dented the solid wall ahead.

‘I think that was the “kill” setting.’

‘More like the “rip from existence” setting,’ she said looking at the dent in the wall.

‘What do you think?’ he asked holding up the flat object.

‘Explosive, similar to timed C4, maybe a bit more powerful,’ Elizabeth told him.

‘”Maybe?” and “a bit?”’ John asked, ‘”a bit” as in, that gun was set to stun or “a bit” as in a bit of fluff?’

Elizabeth gave him an amused look, tilting her head to the side slightly and raising an eyebrow.

‘Never mind,’ he said and moved over to the drones. ‘Do these look different to you?’

‘They’re red, John, instead of yellow,’ Elizabeth said snidely. ‘and they are twice as deadly as the standard drones,’ she added idly as John reached in to pick one up and then carefully pulled his hands back out of the crate.

‘You’re just messing with me right?’ he said turning to look at her.

‘No.’

‘And red ZPM’s mean…’

‘Longer lasting, probably supply more power,’ she said moving over to one and resting her hand on it, ‘if the power that chair had scared you to begin with, you’ll probably have nightmares about its potential now.’

‘Shall we take Rodney a present?’ John asked with a glint of fun in his eye, ‘or three,’ he added indicating a few extra items.

~~**~~

‘Pairing, acquaintance, friend, companion, husband, partner,’ Radek rattled off the possible translations to a word on the wall.

‘Howdy partners,’ John said stepping into the room with a red drone in his arms and Elizabeth close behind him carry several other things, they had only caught the last word of the list.

‘We brought you guys some toys,’ Elizabeth said walking around the table and taking the seat opposite where John was carefully placing the drone. ‘We found these in a storage room downstairs.’

‘Downstairs?’ Rodney said quizzically.

‘Yes, Rodney, you know, you walk down those things that jut out, they call them stairs,’ John quirked.

‘Oh haw, haw, very funny,’ he replied to John and then turned to Elizabeth. ‘I don’t remember there being a storage room lower than this level.’

‘It was hidden Rodney.’

‘And these things were found in the room?’ Radek asked and watched the Atlantis leader nod. ‘Why is the drone red?’

‘Apparently,’ John said fixing Elizabeth with a look of determination, ‘it’s more powerful than normal drones.’

Elizabeth nodded as Rodney and Radek both turned to look at her, there was a small amount of disbelief in their eyes and they watched carefully as Elizabeth looked back at John smiling.

‘Ohromení,’ Radek muttered.

‘What is?’ Elizabeth asked and everyone in the room turned to look at her, ‘What?’

‘I thought Czech wasn’t one of the languages you spoke?’ John questioned with a look of surprise.

‘It’s not, why?’

‘What did Radek just say?’

‘”Amazing”, so?’

‘I said it in Czech,’ Radek said quietly.

‘Oh,’ was all Elizabeth could muster at the news, she wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but at the moment, it wasn’t the most important thing. ‘What’s amazing?’ she said raising an eyebrow at John.

‘This section of the wall,’ Rodney started, ‘tells of weapons and ZPMs hidden in the city, we’re reading it, while you’re finding it,’ he continued explaining the details and other parts of the translation but Elizabeth heard none of it, she was still sat staring at the screen, but her mind was trying hard to figure out the feeling that was tingling its way down her body.

‘Wraith.’

Everyone in the room turned to look at her, and found a small dark marking creeping up her neck and over her face to vanish into her skin. 

‘Colonel Sheppard to the Control Room,’ the tech sounded haunted as he made the announcement which left no doubt in John’s mind that something was going on, he turned to the door to see a few guards running past before he looked back at Elizabeth.

‘In the city?’ he asked.

‘Not yet,’ she swallowed and narrowed her eyes in concentration, ‘the gate’s open,’ John turned and sprinted out the door, the others began after him, following him all the way to the control room.

Elizabeth paused close to the control room, her mind buzzing with feelings, directions to go, fear, and explanations; absolutely everything, but the most frightening thing was the knowledge that any minute now the gate’s shield would turn off and the wraith would start stepping into the city.

She turned stepping closer to the gate room and watching the shimmering pool of water that made up the stable wormhole, the room ahead was empty other than the guards standing ready by the stairs on either side of the room, their forms shadowed on the ground by the light of the vortex.

Without thinking, she stepped into the room, moving slowly towards the centre; passing the armed men and taking each step up towards the Stargate.

‘Ma’am?’ one of the men questioned lowering his gun as she passed in front of his view.

Elizabeth ignored him, her mind fixed on the task, her body moving without meaning too until she came to a stop directly in front of the open Atlantis Stargate.

‘Doctor Weir,’ Major Lorne called as he entered the room, adding more guards to the area, ‘Doctor Weir,’ he tried again louder and this time, his shout was caught by the people in the control room, Rodney and Radek stood in shock with the technicians.

‘Elizabeth,’ John called moving fast from his standing place waiting for an IDC to run down the stairs. As he turned to walk down the main stairwell the gates shield lowered and he paused for a second, turning back to the control room. ‘Get that shield back up.’

The defensive barrier rose again and John sprinted down the stairs, as he moved closer to Elizabeth, she reached out, both hands stretching in front of her with palms up, as if she were ready to take an item.

‘Elizabeth, what are you doing?’ John asked quietly as she stopped close to her back.

‘The Wraith are coming,’ she whispered back as she stretched her arms out to the sides, palms still raised to the ceiling.

‘All the more reason to leave the gate room, you’ll get yourself killed.’

‘No I won’t.’

John glanced to his right, raising an eyebrow to Lorne who shrugged at him, he turned back to look at his leader, usually so logical, so reasonable, but now completely calm as she stood irrationally in the centre of what could become a very dangerous situation. 

He didn’t know what compelled him to do it, but his fingers seemed to move on their own taking his arms with him as he reached up to touch her shoulders lightly before ghosting his fingers along the red top she wore until he brushed the skin of her wrist and was able to flatten his hands out over hers.

The shield lowered again and there were shouts all around him, Rodney’s voice shouting to the armed men in the gate room, he heard the word “milenec” from Radek before the scientist began shouting at the technician to activate the shield, Teyla and Ronon shouting at him to move and take Elizabeth from the room, but it seemed rational thinking had left him too.

One Wraith, two, three Wraith four, John watched, not moving as several Wraith stepped through the gate, weapons raised and shots fired, he didn’t move, he watched the last Wraith step through the gate and take them in before raising his stunner to point at them, he still didn’t move as the monster pulled the trigger and the blast flashed out and seemed to pass right through them.

John closed his eyes, an intense feeling flooding him from head to toe, he saw the flash of green light from behind his eyelids and silence fell. Elizabeth’s hands fell away from his and he reached out as he opened his eyes and she collapsed to the floor.

~~**~~

Elizabeth woke suddenly; her eyes flying open but seeing nothing, a small vibration ran up her body from the tips of her toes to what felt like the ends of each strand of hair before dissipating completely.

She could feel the people around her before she could hear them, Rodney was fidgeting, Carson checking stats, Ronon’s was tense and Teyla concerned, but over all these emotions and movements, she could sense John calm considering what he did, calm considering he was laying in a nearby bed hooked up to as many monitors as she was, and calm considering she knew he felt different now, as if a part of the gene she possessed had shifted into him through their earlier contact.

Her eyes shut again as if no one had noticed they had opened and she took in the slowly growing sounds around her, the beep of the machine, the movements of Rodney and Carson, the conversation of people at a distance and the odd mutterings between Ronon and Teyla as they talked about what happened.

‘She’s awake,’ John muttered from his bed, and everything stopped as everyone turned to look at her. She could feel their eyes fix on her expecting her to open her eyes and look at them, but she didn’t want to see them, she wanted to see him, she could feel him trying to pull back from her, feel the distance he was suddenly trying to install.

‘Elizabeth,’ Carson’s broad voice said tensely. Elizabeth turned her head away hoping they would take the hint and leave, wishing she were anywhere but there, but even though she could feel and see the place she could be; the far end of the main land on the heated beach with nothing but the sand and sea as her company; it didn’t bring her there.

‘Perhaps we should let Doctor Weir rest,’ Teyla said and Elizabeth quietly thanked her for the suggestion as no one else seemed eager to move.

They slowly pulled away closing the curtain around her bed and moved off to find other tasks to occupy their time. She waited until they had all moved far enough away before she opened her eyes and turned to look through the gap left in the curtain at John.

He was looking away, his head turned in the other direction seemingly examining the curtain on the other side of his bed.

‘John,’ she breathed hoarsely, her throat dry and painful. ‘Please John,’ she managed a little louder and watched as he turned to look up at the ceiling before turning to look at her.

‘Not here,’ he said and turned back to the curtain on the other side.

Elizabeth turned her head and looked through the curtain to her right, the door way just beyond it, she moved again to look at him the thought crossing her mind that they could leave without anyone knowing, but wondering if he would want to go with her.

‘We could go; we’re right by the door.’

John looked at her, eyes meeting hers and a smile broke across his face, warmth flooded her, she could feel something deep down, something he was holding back from her and her curiosity almost made her ask him what it was.

He pushed up and started to unplug the monitor pads from his skin and dropping them to his side before switching off the heart monitor and climbing from the bed.

‘Come on then,’ he said smiling as he moved over to her side and switched off her monitor.

Within minutes they were ducking out from the curtained area and walking quickly down the corridor, they darted quickly into a transporter before they were seen and found themselves in an unexplored area of the city, she led the way, walking at a fast pace to her destination with John close behind her.

She felt him reach out before he’d actually acted, his hand gripping her arm he pulled her to a stop and turned her to face him, before pushing her back until she came in contact with the wall. Her eyes met his, for just a moment before he kissed her, a long deep and passionate kiss that left her in no doubt that this was what he had been holding back from doing in the infirmary.

‘I don’t know what happened in the gate room,’ he breathed breaking the kiss, ‘I don’t even remember why I touched you to begin with, but I do know that it felt wonderful, like being somewhere new and safe. I remember the feel of your skin under my fingers, how it made me tingle all over. I wanted to kiss you, I wanted to forget the Wraith carry you out of the room in my arms.’

Elizabeth reached her hand up, running her fingers across his cheek and watching his eyes close at the contact, she kept quiet, the moment too precious, the emotions flowing freely from him wrapping tightly around her heart as she watched his reactions.

‘We belong together John,’ she told him at last, ‘together we can rid the galaxy of all evil,’ she leaned towards him and brushed her lips against his, ‘but alone,’ she whispered not pulling back from him, ‘we are useless against them.’

She let her hand wander, running down over his chest and tugging at the scrubs top he was wearing, shifting it up over his head so he was topless in front of her, she bent low to kiss his chest before taking his hand and leading him to a nearby door.

~~**~~

‘…we have enough armaments in that room to take out every hive ship and dart in the galaxy and then some left over, we can go and use them on the Ori back home,’ Rodney said quickly as he struggled to keep up with John. ‘We could purposely lure the Wraith here, all of them, every single hive ship and dart, and just blow them out of the sky.’

John stopped as he turned out onto the west pier, he was shocked at the sight that greeted him, and Rodney was too as he had stopped beside him, gaping at the beauty that stood on the end watching out over the sea.

John couldn’t look away as he took in Elizabeth’s appearance, her back to him and her hair loose flowing down over her shoulders in the breeze, the long pale green dress she had donned pushed back and forth against her body highlighting every curve of her body as it lifted and fell over her bare feet.

‘Wow,’ Rodney breathed to his right.

John pushed himself forward moving slowly towards her, watching how her arms drifted at her sides almost flowing with the wind, how her hair pulled back over her shoulders and how her skin glowed in the sun light.

‘Elizabeth?’ he questioned, asking timidly why she had come to stand here again, she didn’t move or answer him so he moved to one side and took in her face, she was relaxed with her eyes closed and lips loosely parted. ‘Elizabeth?’ he asked again.

‘I have to go back,’ she said quietly not opening her eyes to look at him and keeping her relaxed stature.

‘Go back where?’

John watched as she turned her face up to the sky and opened her eyes to fix on some point in space and out of sight.

‘Vita,’ she whispered before turning to look at him, ‘I need to go back to the pedestal on Vita.’

~~**~~

John couldn’t help but watch her dress flutter slightly as the rush of air signalled the opening of the Stargate; he was having trouble telling if it was the dress that was making him fall in love with her, or just her. Either way, he didn’t really care; he was in love with her either way.

She had forgone the vest or even changing from the dress, she had stood in the gate room for the whole hour it took them to get ready, and she hadn’t even moved when he, Rodney, Ronon and Teyla moved into the area.

The gate now open, Elizabeth moved forward first and John and Teyla quickly moved to take up positions on either side of her as she vanished, without looking back or saying a word, through the Stargate.

He felt a strange change in his body as he emerged on the other side of the gate out into the purple haze of Vita, and watched Elizabeth as she stopped to turn her face to the sun.

‘Rodney, Ronon, get going, we’ll follow. Don’t stop at the top of the cliff, just head on down,’ he told them and watched as they moved off ahead of them. He stepped closer to the Atlantis leader and placed a hand gently on her lower back; she took the hint and began to move away from the gate.

As expected, when they reached the cliff, Elizabeth paused to look down, the fear returning to her relaxed features and instinctively took a step back, despite the confidence she had shown over the last few days, the control she had managed to harbour in her new found abilities, she was still afraid of falling.

Teyla nodded to John before brushing her hand carefully over Elizabeth’s bare arm and stepping off the edge and vanishing into the precipice, he felt the sharp intake of breath from Elizabeth and turned to look at her.

‘Elizabeth…’ he was ready to say something else to her, but she had turned to look at him, her face and posture completely relaxed. He pulled in a breath as she turned her body towards him and moved in close, her arms moving up to wrap around his neck, before she kissed him and took a single step forward making him step backwards off the cliff.

The sudden sense of falling took over for a moment before John took in the fact that she had pushed them off the edge and plunged them down into the cavern below whilst keeping the kiss. He reached out, wrapping his arms around her body and feeling the soft material of her new outfit beneath his fingers.

The ground came up behind John and he felt the hard surface against his shoulders and back before she broke the kiss and moved to her feet and helped him up.

The walk through the underground tunnels seemed long and drawn as he tried to understand what was happening, she was changed, more confident, more relaxed and much more… different, he couldn’t really think of a word to describe what he was seeing and feeling, he just knew she was no longer the Elizabeth Weir he had met in Antarctica, no longer the demanding woman who was shocked at seeing him in the ancient chair and asked who he was.

She was better, bolder; delicious. He couldn’t help but smile as he thought the last word, the memories of all the times they had kissed over the last few days flooding through his brain like a wave of immense pleasure.

Before he realised it, they had stepped into the open room of the cavern, only their small group in the opened area, but the difference he found was shocking.

The dark walls from their previous visit now held a strong purple glow, as if suddenly illuminated by their presence, the tables of food gone and none of the local people were in sight. The artefacts that lined the room emitted strange noises or rocked on their stands reacting more to Elizabeth as she approached each and dying out as someone like Rodney moved forward.

Elizabeth took a step towards the central pedestal and stopped her head snapping to the right and John followed her stone like gaze to the young girl who had walked into the room, she couldn’t have been more than fifteen and she stood frozen to the spot, eyes fixed on Elizabeth in fear and shock as the item in her hand, forgotten, fell to the floor with a dull “clunk”.

He returned his gaze to the beauty in the centre of the room and watched as she looked back at the orb and one again moved towards it.

One step.

Two steps.

Three steps.

The orb lit up; growing brighter with each step she took towards it until she was standing up close to the pedestal and reached out to touch it, but it seemed to have peaked and would not do as she wanted, he could feel her frustration coursing through his veins as if every emotion she felt was directly linked to him.

‘”Together we can rid the galaxy of all evil, alone, we are useless against them”,’ John said and felt every head turn in his direction, everyone that is, except Elizabeth’s. He moved forward, handing his P-90 to Teyla as he passed her and stepped around to the opposite side of the orb.

He reached out at the same time she did, both placing hands on top of the device as the glowing continued, as soon as they touched it, the light from its centre spiked blinding both of them and every occupant of the room for just a moment.

Out the corner of his eyes he saw the teenaged girl turn and run from the room as a din set in and John was able to focus on Elizabeth. Her eyes fixed on his and she smiled at him before turning her eyes to look up at the ceiling.

‘Wow,’ Ronon even sounded impressed to John’s ears as he looked up at the imagery around him, planets floating lazily across the room above their heads in much the same way as the first recording they had found in Atlantis when they arrived, each sun a golden ball, each planet a blue one and each moon a silver orb circling their celestial body.

John could make out the clusters and debris fields that where scattered across the expanse of space above him. He moved away from the orb to examine a few areas, the solar system Rodney had destroyed, Athos, the Athosians home world, and Atlantis, a blue dot with a silver glow around it.

‘It’s a map of the Pegasus Galaxy,’ Rodney pointed out and John looked to the edges of the map and watched as a small ship appeared and began to move quickly across the map.

‘The Daedalus,’ he said and instantly the map labelled the ship “Daedalus”. John idly wondered if there were other ships in the galaxy besides the Wraith and suddenly millions of little dots appeared, green specks labelled “Wraith” littered the map and the occasional unknown ship appeared in red.

‘My goodness,’ a voice said to John’s left and he turned to see the young girl following a man into the room, his eyes fixed on the map above them, it seemed to be a struggle to look away and he eventually managed to take in each person before spotting Elizabeth and suddenly dropping to his knees followed quickly by the girl. ‘My apologies, I did not mean to interrupt, Nyan told me we had visitors,’ he said indicating the girl quickly.

‘Get up,’ Elizabeth said and John looked furiously at her for giving their hosts an order in such a demanding tone. ‘Please, I’m just here for information, we will leave soon,’ she added and John watched as the man cautiously got to his feet and turned to tug the girl up as well.

‘My name is Demali,’ he said with a small bow, ‘is there something we can get for you? Anything at all, please, we are here to serve the Queen,’ he bowed again and John turned his raised eyebrow to Elizabeth who shook her head at him and looked back up at the map.

‘Look at this,’ Rodney’s glee filled voice floated across the room and John turned to see what the scientist had found. At one edge of the map a large cluster of Wraith ships hovered around several small planets. ‘There must be like eighty or ninety ships hive ships here.’

Standing below this area John looked back over the galaxy and gave a quick count of the other ships, small groups of ships had formed in several places, but no more than five ships were grouped in these areas, the odd individual ship drifted idly between planets but never came close to any groupings of Wraith.

‘There must be at least one hundred ships,’ Teyla said in awe seemingly having followed John’s thought pattern.

‘One hundred and thirty three,’ John and Elizabeth said simultaneously.

‘We could do it John,’ Elizabeth continued, she crossed the room to him and Rodney before continuing; ‘we could take out this cluster of ships. With this,’ she added the last two words as an after thought and John watched the small shimmering silver ball appear just outside the group of gathering.

‘What is that?’ Ronon asked.

‘An ancient outpost,’ John said smiling at Elizabeth, we take several Jumpers of weapons from the storage room, sneak in, load it up and take them out.’

‘With them out of the way,’ Elizabeth piped in, ‘the other ships will group together, forming a smaller cluster somewhere; and then we just need to lure them to Atlantis.’

‘Oh, easy,’ Rodney muttered sarcastically. John turned to give him his usual “be quiet” look.

‘Did you bring your video camera?’ He asked the scientist as he narrowed his eyes on him.

‘Yes, of course I did, what do you think I am, stupid? Wait, don’t answer that,’ Rodney said before digging into his vest pockets and pulling out the small camera.


	5. Chapter 5

‘The Jumpers have been restocked and the weapons fully loaded, they are now packing as much into the jumper as they can possibly fit,’ John said walking through the corridors with Elizabeth at his side. ‘McKay’s complaining about being claustrophobic, but he agreed to be the first Jumper pilot, so he’s now gotta wait for the other three Jumpers to be loaded.’

‘I should be going with you,’ Elizabeth piped in, they had gone through the plan hundreds of times over the last week and were now putting it into action, but Elizabeth had a feeling something was going to go horribly wrong and she knew none of them would be able to handle that many Wraith ships at once, but she could.

They crossed the gate room and started up the stairs in silence before stopping in the control room to check on the operations there, Zelenka sat watching them from in front of the sensor screen while others made preparations for the departing team.

‘You’re in command again Elizabeth, you need to be here, especially with me, Rodney, Lorne and Beckett piloting the jumpers,’ John piped in as they started towards the stairs up to the jumper bay.

‘Radek, Teyla and Ronon can handle things here,’ she said following him up the stairs and out of sight of Radek who had followed her with his eyes the whole time, ‘If something goes wrong on your end….’ 

‘Nothing is going to go wrong,’ John said stopping to turn and face her on the stairs, ‘we have the plan in place, the weapons to destroy the Wraith and everything, it will just take the four of us to sneak into the array, load the weapons points, plug in a ZPM and blow the whole lot of them out of the sky.’

Elizabeth took another step up levelling herself off with him. She let her eyes drop, looking down instead of at him as she took in a few calming breaths. 

John reached out sensing that she was having trouble saying what was on her mind; he ran his fingers carefully down her right cheek and watched her face relax into his touch.

‘Elizabeth,’ he said and she raised her eyes to meet his, ‘nothing is going to go wrong,’ he leaned in and brushed his lips over hers, ‘and if it does, I can have fun beating Rodney into fixing it.’

‘Colonel,’ Teyla said interrupting a second kiss, she caught sight of the intimacy between them and fought off the sly knowing grin that was attempting to creep across her lips. ‘I am sorry, I did not mean to interrupt,’ she raised an eyebrow at them as John shook his head. ‘They are ready for you.’

John gave Elizabeth a shy smile and turned to move up the stairs leaving her alone with Teyla.

Up in the Jumper bay, John could clearly hear Rodney’s continued complaints, no longer about being closed into a Jumper, but because it was taking so long for them all to get ready. The rear doors of each ready Jumper was still open and one of each of Major Lorne’s team was standing at the back of the weapons pile ready to go, John knew he would be the only person not to have someone else in his Jumper and was thankful for that as he didn’t want to make small talk to avoid the horribly growing fear that Elizabeth was right; something was going to happen.

He made his way between the stacks of items already in the back of his Jumper and dropped into the pilot’s seat to start the pre-flight checks, it was half an hour before they were ready to go, and John couldn’t help but think that it would have been much quicker if Rodney hadn’t complained between each check list item.

‘Control, this is Jumper two, we are packed and ready to go,’ John said as he reached for the door controls and closed the rear hatch.

‘Jumper two, you are clear to go, have a safe journey,’ the voice of a control technician came back.

‘Jumpers three, five and six, follow my lead and cloak the second you exit the gate,’ John said and waited for confirmation from each of the other Jumper pilots.

John eased his Jumper from the ground and felt the strain of all the extra weight, concentrating harder, he dialled the gate and began to lower the ship down through the open floor to the gate room and swung slowly around so he could wave goodbye to Elizabeth, but he didn’t find her there, he saw Teyla, looking as though she had inadvertently taken command of the room, Ronon lazily leaning against a wall and Zelenka looking as though he had seen a ghost.

He finally turned to face the gate and heard the tell tail signs of another jumper lowering down above him. John closed his eyes briefly before accelerating through the gate and out of sight.

~~**~~

Teyla made her way quickly up the stairs to the Jumper bay and looked around the empty room, she took note of the empty lots where four Puddle Jumpers once sat, all now on their way to destroy the Wraith and she felt a sad longing take over at the thought of missing out on such an event.

‘Elizabeth?’ she called through the dimly lit room, looking around her to take in the content of the room, she knew Elizabeth had stayed up here when the team left and when the doctor hadn’t emerged a few minutes after their departure Teyla had found it hard not to come and make sure the woman was alright.

She crossed the bay to where Jumper two had last been stood and noticed that something was missing, a spare vest and P-90 that had been laying against the far wall was no longer in its place and realisation suddenly sunk in. The team of seven that had left in four Puddle Jumpers was now a team of eight. Elizabeth Weir had gone with them.

Teyla turned abruptly and ran the length of the room and down to the control room, the onset of panic rising quickly as she told Radek and Ronon that their leader had gone.

~~**~~

As uneventful as it was to fly a cloaked Jumper through enemy occupied space, John couldn’t help but wish he could do something stupid, like fire a single drone at the Wraith Dart patrolling between planets.

He resisted as he slowly approached the Ancient outpost and watched three darts circle the floating array and then move off towards a planet. He paused, hovering nearby and out of their path and ordered the other Jumpers to stop and wait, he had a feeling it wasn’t going to be as easy as they thought getting into the outpost.

John watched one of the darts as it reached the planet, turned and shot back across the open space and met up with the other two darts, they once again circled the outpost and disappeared off back towards a different planet.

‘They’re patrolling the outpost,’ Rodney’s voice sounded high and nervous, ‘that’s just great, how exactly are we meant to get in there with three darts circling it?’

‘Rodney,’ John cut him off before he could add more to his ranting, ‘calm down, and shut up, I’m trying to think.’

‘First time for everything,’ Rodney shot at him and John heard Lorne chuckle at the comment.

John continued to watch the first dart as it turned back to the array, circled it and took off towards the final planet, they had a formation; each dart would hit the orbit of each of the nearest three planets and then circle the outpost between them.

The dart he was watching turned from the planet and circled the array again, but to John’s surprise, it didn’t head off to the first planet, it turned and shot off towards the nearest hive ship, the other two following in its wake.

‘Stay here,’ John ordered the other Jumpers and pushed his forward, he approached quickly, docked and waited as he saw three new Wraith darts emerge from the hive ship and begin their patrol. As they circled once and parted to their planets, John heaved a sigh of relief and then cursed loudly, he had forgotten he had no one else in the Jumper with him, and was now wondering just how he was going to get onto the array.

He swung around, gripping his P-90 in his hand as the rear door opened; confused he moved to the edge of the supply piles and peaked through a gap.

‘Elizabeth!’ John said exasperated and she turned to look back at him. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing here, the idea of Ronon and Teyla staying behind was to protect you?’

‘I’m more useful here, John,’ she breathed as she pulled a tool kit from the overhead storage and moved towards the hatch of the outpost.

‘You know, we have no idea if there’s air on that station,’ he said giving in to the fact that Elizabeth was there now.

‘Then shut yourself in the cockpit.’

‘Elizabeth…’

‘I’ll be fine,’ she told him prying the cover off the door panel.

‘Elizabeth…’ he tried again.

John moved quickly as the door between the cockpit and rear section began to close, Elizabeth was shutting him in.

‘Elizabeth…’ he choked out as the door closed.

‘Colonel,’ Major Lorne asked in a whisper over the radio, ‘how exactly do you plan to get onto the outpost, you have no one in your rear compartment.’

‘Elizabeth snuck on board,’ he told them, ‘she’s prying the doors open now.’

‘Are you crazy,’ Rodney practically screamed, ‘there’s no AV suit on your Jumper, how’s she gonna breathe, she’s gonna suffocate…’

‘I don’t think she will,’ John said shocked at how calm he sounded compared to how anxious he felt. ‘We just have to wait for her to get inside, and start unloading my Jumper, then we’ll start trading places.’

~~**~~

Ronon shot through the gate followed closely by two SO’s he didn’t need to stop and tell one of them to wait, he just carried on as one of the pair stopped by the DHD and the other continued to follow him, it was 20 minutes of running before Ronon turned his head and called behind him for the other SO to wait there. Seconds later he had ran off the end of cliff and was plummeting down.

He landed on his feet and took off down the corridor turning the corners and taking the bends easily until he came to the open room with an orb sat glowing in the centre, the galaxy’s map still glowed around the room and Ronon slowed down to approach the area that Sheppard and his team had gone to.

In amongst all the Wraith ships, four small ancient crafts were sat, three of them outside the area, seemingly keeping a distance as three darts headed towards them, the other attached to an ancient hub. Ronon wished briefly that he could see people on the map, humans and ancients and that he could see more clearly what was actually happening.

So the map complied, and the large expanse of space he was focused on grew to fill the room, the ancient outpost clearly shaped and each of the Puddle Jumpers fading in and out of view to indicate that they were cloaked.

Ronon watched as one small red dot in the docked Jumper stepped off the craft and onto the outpost for just a moment before turning back and returning to the ship. He watched as the three circling darts returned and one of them came very close to the Puddle Jumper, as it moved away the red dot at the front of the ship moved quickly back.

~~**~~

‘We need to get this stuff off here now,’ John called to Elizabeth through the door that separated them, ‘Elizabeth!’

Before he could think about it he opened the door and found himself staring at a gap in the boxes. He felt the rush of air as it suddenly thinned, but it didn’t completely vanish, there was enough air between the station and the Jumper to keep them alive.

John climbed over the boxes and began pulling them off the Jumper as quickly as he could; piling them with those Elizabeth had already moved. When it was finally empty, he turned back to see Elizabeth sat on a box watching him.

‘I’ll wait here,’ she told him, watching the flicker of fear that passed over his face. ‘You need to trade with the others, I’ll help them unload.’

John nodded, turned to walk back to the Jumper but stopped, he closed his eyes, considering what he was about to do, it could be the biggest mistake of his life, but he needed to say it before something went wrong.

He turned quickly, closed the distance between him and Elizabeth and pulled her to her feet and into a passionate kiss; he couldn’t remember ever kissing someone this way before, or feeling the way he felt as she began to return it with a hunger that rivalled his own.

They parted; gasping for air and John took Elizabeth’s face in his hands and held her gaze, her stunning green eyes seemed to twinkle at him as if they held the galaxy inside, and he smiled as he considered it possible.

‘I’ve wanted to say this for a long time,’ he said, his heart beating faster as an irrational fear of rejection overtook.

‘John…’

‘Shhh,’ he brushed his lips over hers lightly before taking a deep breath. ‘You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met…’

‘John,’ she breathed and leaned in close to him, feeling the sting of tears in her eyes, she couldn’t believe he was picking now to say this.

‘I love you, Elizabeth,’ he said and pulled her against his chest, ‘and I wish you’d stayed on Atlantis for this.’

‘John, you need to go,’ she told him, pulling back from his chest. He moved away feeling slightly dejected, he reached the Jumper doors when she called out to him. ‘I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love you,’ she watched him smile before turning back to the ship and disappearing from sight.

~~**~~

‘It has been over eight hours, Ronon; you are telling us they are still unloading the jumpers?’ Teyla’s frustrated voice drifted over the radio to Ronon who stood in the middle of the map that circled his head, the station still the focus of his attention as he watched the final jumper fly quickly towards it and dock.

‘They had problems, there are Wraith darts patrolling the outpost. They only seem to change over every two hours; the last jumper is docking now.’

‘This is more frustrating than I anticipated,’ Teyla said, lowering her head as she leaned against one of the control panels in the gate room, ‘we should be there helping them,’ she added and waited for Ronon to agree.

Behind her Radek suddenly cursed and she turned to look at him as he climbed to his feet.

‘Ronon,’ he said quickly before stammering in Czech and then taking a breath translated, ‘are any of the people on the map different colours to the rest?’ he had been told about the map and how it was marked up, different colours for each object or species.

‘Yeah; Why?’ Ronon replied his voice cracked at the boosted transmission between the other two SO’s on the planet with him.

‘How many, and where are they?’

‘Two; one on the first Jumper, still floating out of range of the darts, the other on the station,’ He replied and waited for an explanation.

‘It would have been pointless,’ Radek said to Teyla.

‘I do not understand,’ Teyla said quirking an eyebrow at the scientist, ‘what would have been pointless?’

‘Elizabeth staying here,’ he moved back to his laptop and yanked it off the desk, ‘the translation of the wall McKay found on his way back from the map room explains that Kheita was destined to fail,’ he watched Teyla turn and exchange a look with the technician, ‘she failed because no one would go near her, they were afraid of her power and as a result, she had no…’ he paused, ‘she had no lover,’ he blurted the last words out quickly before looking away.

‘She is not powerful enough alone,’ Teyla tested slowly, ‘Elizabeth needs a partner to bring the power out.’

‘Yes.’

‘Doctor Weir doesn’t have a lover, not that I know of anyway,’ Ronon added having listened to conversation.

‘She does,’ Teyla said the sly smile from earlier returning, ‘I interrupted an intimate moment between her and John before they left.’

‘They’re going to fail,’ Radek said boldly and the smile feel from the Athosians face. ‘It says on the wall, that in order to release her full power, they have to be wed, and last I checked, neither Elizabeth nor Colonel Sheppard were married, especially not to each other.’

~~**~~

Elizabeth checked her watch as she sat waiting for the standard change over of the Wraith darts, John needed to be in the dock before the switch was completed so they could finally finish their preparations. It had been eight hours since the mission had begun and she was beginning to feel the strain of all the work and the fear of being captured or discovered. But there was something else niggling at the back of her brain.

‘Ok,’ Rodney stated as he pulled up from under a control panel, ‘I know how to get the power going again, Lorne has the weapons ports loaded and Carson has the ZedPMs in place, we just need Sheppard to get in here and we can start blowing them up.’

Elizabeth nodded but remained silent, Rodney seemed pleased with how the plan was going so far and didn’t notice the concentrated fear that Elizabeth was trying to work past. She barely noticed as both Major Lorne and Carson stepped back into the dock port, or that the docked Jumper pulled away as she realised what was troubling her.

‘This isn’t right,’ she said quietly.

‘Excuse me,’ Carson said barely picking up the spoken words, ‘what’s not right?’

Elizabeth hesitated before turning her face carefully to look up at the three expectant faces watching her, fear, confusion and wonder etched into every line of their strained features at the long task of the day.

‘The Wraith know we’re here.’

‘What?’ Lorne said shocked at the realisation.

‘Yeah, what he said,’ Rodney added as Carson ran a hand over his face.

‘They’re waiting for something,’ she said sounding more cryptic and mysterious than she had intended to.

‘Doctor Weir,’ Elizabeth almost jumped when the voice of one of Lorne’s team members came over the radio. ‘Colonel Sheppard’s Jumper just uncloaked; there’s no one on board ma’am.’

They moved as one, closing the distance between them and the nearest window. Out in the dead of space, a single Puddle Jumper was drifting idly, the pilot’s window in clear view from where the group stood and not a single person was on board.

‘John…’

Their eyes fixed on the Jumper in concern as they all tried to work out what was going on, but their expressions soon changed as the Jumper unexpectedly exploded and everyone except Elizabeth closed their eyes against the bright flash of the light from the multiple weapons and explosives that had been on board.

‘I hope he wasn’t still on board,’ Carson’s words barely registered as she turned her eyes away from the debris and towards the nearest hive ship.

‘He wasn’t,’ she muttered through gritted teeth and everyone followed her gaze to the ship.

‘How exactly did he get captured, my team has been watching all the ships in the area, there’s no way one of them could have gone by him unnoticed and… beamed him up.’

‘Not unless they had a cloak,’ Rodney joked, ‘oh no,’ he said as he caught Elizabeth’s raised brow, ‘don’t tell me they have at least one cloaked…’

‘Jumper,’ Elizbabeth interrupted. ‘They have a modified Jumper, they’ve known we were here from the start, and they know where the other three Jumpers are.’

‘That’s great…’ Rodney started.

‘If they can use a Jumper to find us, then we can use one to find them,’ Lorne pointed out.

‘Call one of the Jumpers back,’ Elizabeth said, ‘you three will finish preparations, I’m going…’

‘That’s insane,’ Rodney started, ‘you can’t go after him.’

‘I agree, you’ll get yourself killed on that ship, Elizabeth,’ Carson piped in, ‘I mean, have you seen the size of it, you have no idea where…’

‘I know exactly where he is, Carson, I’ve known his location since I woke up two days after being on that planet.’

‘What?’

‘I can’t explain it now, we don’t have time to talk about this, I can find him and I can get him out.’

‘You can’t go alone,’ Lorne said, he knew arguing would be pointless.

‘Then I’ll take whoever you call back.’

~~**~~

‘Sheppard’s been captured.’

‘What?’ Teyla practically shouted as she met Ronon at the bottom of the cliff and headed towards the map room.

‘It happened a few minutes ago, an unknown ship left the hive, flew past him and seemed to transport from the Jumper to the other ship,’ Ronon explained as he led Teyla and Radek through the tunnels.

‘Wow,’ Radek exclaimed as they stepped into the room, he took in the map, still zoomed in on the Ancient Outpost.

‘Jumpers,’ Ronon explained pointing out the three Jumpers, one of which was moving to dock with the array, ‘Wraith,’ he added indicating the many ships that littered the expanse of space, ‘the array, still has Beckett, McKay, Lorne and Weir on board, looks like that’s about to change.’

They watched as the Jumper docked between circling Wraith darts and Elizabeth moved on board.

‘Wait,’ Radek said realising just who was boarding the ship. ‘Elizabeth is going?’

‘Looks that way.’

‘I am not sure which is worse,’ Teyla said as the darts circled and moved away and the docked Jumper took off, ‘watching, or sitting in Atlantis not knowing what is happening.’

~~**~~

‘You’re sure they don’t know we’re here, ma’am.’

‘Relax Reed; so long as that Jumper is cloaked and no one is on theirs, we’re safe.’

‘We’re on a hive ship, Doctor Weir, there’s no such thing as safe.’

Elizabeth chuckled as she stepped off the Jumper in the luckily empty bay, she paused just off the ramp and looked back over her shoulder.

‘Make sure that thing stays cloaked.’

‘Right, of course.’

~~**~~

‘My team are watching for Lieutenant Reed’s Jumper to show up again, as soon as it does, we should be ready to start firing, chances are they won’t be coming back alone.’

‘Right,’ Rodney said looking around at Lorne who had just finished talking with the other members of his team and Carson, who stood by the window watching the hive ship as if he would be able to see the approaching Puddle Jumper, ‘we need to be ready, so why don’t you two go get ready to fire on whatever is going to come and attack us and I… I will double check the power settings so I know it will work when I switch on the ZedPM.’

~~**~~

Elizabeth had her back against the cold wall of the Wraith ship, her hands tightly gripping the P-90 in her hand, holding it close to her chest as several Wraith passed her by without notice. To her left Lieutenant Reed was holding his breath in a silent prayer that their badly picked location, wouldn’t end up being worse than expected.

‘Let’s go,’ Elizabeth whispered, and Reed’s eyes flew open to watch her slip past him and off up the corridor.

They stopped at a cross point in the corridor and Elizabeth blindly looked down each of the three tunnels in an attempt to select the correct one.

‘Doctor Weir,’ Reed spoke up as the sound of footsteps began from behind them, ‘I don’t mean to rush you, ma’am, but…’

‘This way,’ she said and started down the path to her right, ‘you know, I don’t think I’ve ever been on one of these ships.’

‘You should take that as a good thing,’ Reed replied sarcastically, ‘I mean; it’s not like it’s a good vacation spot or has any good shopping malls.’

‘That sounds like something I’d say.’

Elizabeth had stopped walking as he spoke and Reed now turned to see John smiling at him from behind a Wraith cell door.

‘That was easy,’ Reed said with a quirk of the head.

‘Told you I’d find him,’ Elizabeth said, ‘you can’t get away from me that easy Colonel.’

‘A choice between you and the Wraith, come on Elizabeth, even Caldwell stands more chance of winning,’ John gave her a boyish smile and took in her narrowed eyes at his comment, ‘now, do you two wanna get me out, or did you just come to mock me?’

‘Mocking sounds good to me, Lieutenant?’

‘Definitely a good option.’

~~**~~

‘The Wraith darts have changed formation,’ Lorne shouted from his seat, he was sat in a control chair between Rodney’s location and Beckett’s he had just been told by one of the Jumper pilots that the Wraith had increased their patrol between two planets behind them, and the circling Wraith were no longer circling, but hovering as if waiting for a command.

‘I’m not ready yet,’ Rodney shouted back, ‘I need more time.’

‘I don’t think we have any,’ Lorne replied getting ready to stand up. ‘Jumper three has been sighted, they are under attack McKay; we need power, NOW!’

‘Ok, I got it,’ Rodney screamed and the lights suddenly illuminated the area, the arrays shielding sprang to life and the battle began.

Weapons fire from the darts hovering nearby struck the outpost, several hundreds of wraith cruisers and darts left hive ships to join the battle, filling the quadrant of space with a mass of weapons on small explosions, the two hovering Jumpers were the first into action providing backup for Jumper three as it shot towards the outpost as fast as possible, firing its full load of drones at whatever got in the way.

‘It’s not working,’ Lorne screamed, his attempts to fire anything from the chair had so far been without success, ‘McKay!’

‘Carson, you got anything?’ Rodney shouted as he reached Lorne’s chair and ripped open the panel at the base.

‘Nothing,’ Carson replied, ‘nothings working other than the shield, ‘the Wraith must have done something to the systems.’

‘Oh, who’d have thought that the Wraith would be that smart?’

~~**~~

‘Why aren’t they firing?’ Radek questioned as he watched the battle raging just above his head, he felt oddly like a God watching his minions wage war on each other, a small game of whose got the better weapons or who had the most time learning their respective skills.

The jumper that had left the hive ship suddenly veered off, several dart ships following its uncloaked hull as it carried towards one of the planets, two other jumpers followed it, and just as they moved away the unknown ship emerged from the Wraith ship and sped towards the array.

‘I don’t think it’s going too well,’ Ronon said as he took the cup of water from the woman who was offering them around to the small group.

‘There has to be a way to contact them,’ Teyla said looking between Radek and Ronon. ‘Perhaps we could send another Jumper?’

‘All the pilots are already out there,’ Radek pointed out glumly. 

‘There must be a way; they need to know how to complete the task before they are all killed.’

‘We have a communications tower,’ the woman who had weaved her way from Ronon passed Teyla and had stopped by Radek before she spoke.

The map above them suddenly pulled back and they found themselves looking at a transmission ring that ran around their current location out across the galaxy to engulf two planets and the array, one of the planets currently had a disabled Jumper heading towards it for a crash landing.

‘These people,’ the woman indicated the planet the Jumper was approaching, ‘have a receiver, we have been friends with them for a long time, the Wraith leave them to grow their population, then they attack, we usually house them what that happens.’

‘Could they find the people in this ship, and give them a message?’ 

‘Of Course, if someone would like to come with me,’ she said indicating the door.

‘Radek,’ Teyla said and watched as the Scientist scrambled to his feet from the floor and moved to follow the woman.

~~**~~

‘Elizabeth,’ John said tapping her face in an attempt to rouse her, ‘come on Elizabeth, we don’t have time for naps,’ he looked over his shoulder at Lieutenant Reed who was standing at the entrance to the Jumper on guard.

‘We need to move, sir,’ he said and moved to the other side of the Jumper hatch.

‘Right,’ he said sliding his arm under Elizabeth’s neck and pulling her close to his chest, ‘lets get going,’ he added before slipping the other hand under her knees and dragging her up off the floor.

They walked for a while, moving as far away from the Jumper as possible, the Wraith would no doubt be there by now and looking for them, he paused as a sound from ahead caught their attention and John moved quickly to hide the still unconscious Elizabeth and himself behind a large tree.

‘Please, I mean you no harm,’ the man said, his hands rose as he stepped out from behind a tree. ‘Are you Sheppard?’

‘I am,’ John said moving back out of his hiding place, ‘and you would be?’

‘Savric, I have a message from someone named Zelenka,’ he said indicating that they should follow, ‘the village is this way; we have a doctor and priests.’

‘A priest?’ Reed asked as he followed John and the man through the forest.

‘She’s exhausted, not hurt and definitely not dying,’ John said angrily.

‘You misunderstand me, your message is that Zelenka has finished his translation, he believes that for Weir to have full control of her abilities, she must wed the man she loves; I was told that was you.’

~~**~~

‘Try it now!’ Rodney said as he slammed the panel on the base of the control chair shut.

‘That’s it, drones are away,’ Lorne said as a series of drones pelted from the bay below.

‘One down, twenty more to go,’ Rodney said as he moved away to start fixing other things.

‘I’m gonna need someone down there to reload,’ Lorne said as the scientist moved away.

‘I’ll go,’ Carson offered as Rodney pulled open another panel, he knew the lower deck would be noisy and dark, and a little scary, but he also knew that if the drones ran out, they wouldn’t have much time to reload.

‘Concentrate on the hive ships.’

‘I am; my drones are getting intercepted.’

~~**~~

‘Hey,’ John said, ‘I’ve been waiting for an hour to get back into the fight,’ John smiled down at Elizabeth as she lay on the bed inside the priests hut.

‘What happened?’

‘You exhausted yourself giving us a soft landing, slowed us down and put us down safely before you passed out.’

Elizabeth closed her eyes concentrating her thoughts on the war that took place in space above them, the outpost was firing away, and the Jumpers were still in tact and doing some real damage. She was dragged back down to the ground when an emotion flushed through her from John.

‘What’s wrong?’ She asked confused by the sensation.

‘These people have a comm.’s tower, they got a message from a friend who was entertaining Radek Zelenka,’ John paused for a moment considering the best way to word the message. ‘Radek finished translating the wall McKay found, he found out how to “unleash your full potential,” so to speak.’

Elizabeth frowned at him, the message made sense, but he was still holding something back.

‘Well…,’ she asked after he didn’t continue.

‘You have to be married to the one person who, “completes” you,’ he used his fingers to emphasize the word “completes”.

‘So I’m useless unless I’m married to…’

‘Me,’ he said and tilted his head in thought, ‘unless I’m missing something,’ he said with a small amount of humour.

Silence fell between them, neither wanting to ask the inevitable question, John bit his tongue, he could just ask her to marry him now; he had spent his time in the Wraith ship considering the possibility of asking her when they got back.

‘Elizabeth,’ he said eventually concluding that the only way to get back would be to test this theory out, ‘will you marry me?’

‘John,’ Elizabeth fought off a smile at the question, ‘this isn’t the…’

‘The way you planned it would be, I know, but what are the chances of us getting out of this alive without this possibility, if our being married will let loose a power to kill the Wraith, then we can do a quick wedding here, with the local God-sayer and then do it properly in a few months,’ he leaned forward and kissed her gently. ‘I’m down on my knees and everything here.’

Elizabeth couldn’t help but laugh, she hadn’t realised the bed she was on was so low.

‘We need only one witness and we could do this in the privacy of this hut,’ the priest said inadvertently interrupting their conversation.

‘You promise me we’ll do this properly later?’

‘I would do anything for you, I’ll even give you two honeymoons, especially if this works,’ John said helping Elizabeth to her feet. ‘If this works, we’ll have to buy Zelenka a few rounds.’

Sensing that things were rushed, the priest sped through the ceremony to unite them, Reed was stood in the door way, as requested, listening in, but keeping his guarding post on the hut in case the Wraith paid them a visit.

‘By the ancestors power,’ Hagan finally said, ‘I bid you a long life and many happy moments, you are forever bound together.’

‘I love this part,’ John said as he turned to Elizabeth with a smile on his face. He reached out, pulled her close to his body and kissed her with all the love he could muster.

As the kiss increased he could feel a build up in the pit of his stomach, it hadn’t started with him; he could feel it growing faster and stronger through Elizabeth from the moment he kissed her. The power grew and he was forced to break the kiss to wrap his arms tightly around her as they rose from the ground together.

Elizabeth’s head was back, her arms limp behind her and she felt John’s hands on the small of her back beneath her shirt as pure energy engulfed her from the inside out, the pain was vast. She considered briefly that she would be ripped apart, her blood seemed to boil, her veins felt as though they were ripping and she suddenly let out a long scream as everything seemed to freeze around her.

~~**~~

‘I…’ Rodney was about to say he hated the Wraith, when a bright blinding green light flashed through the outpost, he squeezed his eyes shut at the familiar light.

When he opened his eyes again, there was nothing but silence around him, the sound of the drones being fired from the chair had stopped; the sound of small explosions from outside had vanished. Rodney turned quickly as footsteps echoed from behind him.

‘What the hell was that?’ Carson said as he stepped into the room.

‘Elizabeth,’ Rodney said as he moved quickly to the window.

Outside, was empty, quiet space, the only ships in sight were the uncloaking Puddle Jumpers they had arrived in.

‘The Wraith are gone,’ Lorne said with a hint of amusement in his voice. ‘No ships, no ugly faces, no stunners,’ he scanned the horizon, ‘nothing!’

‘How?’ Carson questioned breathlessly.

‘That light, was the same stuff Elizabeth let out when she and Colonel Sheppard were… “Connected” back in Atlantis,’ Rodney explained, ‘she collapsed right after it.’

‘Kaufman,’ Lorne said into his radio, ‘come pick us up.’

~~**~~

Ronon was ahead of them all as they ran at full speed back to towards the gate of the overly purple planet, he reached the already open gate and vanished into the wormhole that was being held open by the SO he had left there.

Teyla and Radek followed at a small distance behind them and vanished through the gate with the guards.

Back in Atlantis, the group looked around; the techs up in the control room had got to their feet and were looking down on them expectantly.

‘It is done,’ Teyla said breathing hard and smiling broadly, ‘the Wraith have been destroyed.’

An explosion of sound resonated through the room and out in the corridors nearby, the word was spreading fast and the celebrations had begun. The cheer of sound that had started suddenly died away as the gate began to dial in. Quickly, the group moved from in front of it and watched as it opened.

‘Doctor McKay’s IDC,’ the tech proclaimed more joyful than he should have been.

The shield lowered and everyone waited in silence, breaths held, for the jumpers to reappear. The first Jumper came through and the applause was back as Kaufman and Reed waved back at those they could see before rising out of sight.

The second Jumper followed soon after and Rodney smiled from the pilot’s seat with the final member of Lorne’s team beside him, they rose up and out of sight just as several people stepped through.

John and Elizabeth were last to enter the control room and grinned around at the welcome they received, the whistles and clapping raising for them and John raised a hand in salute to the military personnel that littered the room.

He dropped the salute and turned to Elizabeth with a cheeky grin planted firmly on his face before he wrapped his arms tightly around her and kissed her.


	6. Chapter 6

She felt odd, in her dress, she had never worn anything so long and so elaborate before in her life. Her skirts were usually down to her ankles, but never down to the ground in this manner. But it wasn’t the focus of her attention, the beautifully constructed church behind her, the lavish green field ahead and the head stones off to her right were more interesting; those and the buildings jutting up in the distance along the horizon. 

Earth was beautiful, there was no denying it, the smell of pollution was something she had yet to get used to, but Teyla didn’t mind it all that much as she stood waiting outside the stone built church with a woman she had met only this morning.

‘There she is,’ the brown haired woman said, her long lavish curls falling past her shoulders. Teyla checked her dress, making sure the pleats of lace that covered the silk layers were flattened as much as possible in the light breeze of the sunny day.

Elizabeth had told her she could keep the dress; she was sure she would never have an occasion to wear such a beautiful outfit again, but she would at the end of the day, return it to its plastic covering and store it safely in her closet when they returned to Atlantis.

The long limousine pulled up along side the church gate and the driver climbed gracefully from the front and moved to the back to open the door and offer his hand to the woman inside.

Margret Weir emerged first, followed by a stocky gentleman Teyla had been told was Elizabeth’s Uncle Richard. Dressed in his top hat and tails, Richard paused outside the door and turned back to help Elizabeth out.

Teyla’s breath caught, she had seen the dress, and she had seen Elizabeth many times over the last three years, but never had she dreamed that the Atlantis Expedition leader would look so beautiful. The white dress, designed in a similar fashion to that of the dresses Teyla and Elizabeth’s cousin Heidi wore, but was pure white and had more elaborately designed edges and lace covering than theirs.

Her slippers were white as well and peeked out from the bottom of her dress, they were slim heels that gave Elizabeth just enough height that she would stand equal to her groom. The light dusting of make-up that had been expertly applied to her relaxed and confident features gave Elizabeth the air of a young queen ready to take her place on the throne. It was all complimented by her curls, tamed from their usual unruly state just for the occasion.

The long vale was back, running down the back of her dress to leave a small train behind her. Heidi moved forward, spoke with her cousin and then moved to gather the train from the ground before following Elizabeth towards Teyla.

‘You look amazing, Elizabeth,’ Teyla practically whispered, her breath caught in her throat at the sight. Elizabeth blushed and lowered her head for a moment before composing herself to thank Teyla with a smile.

‘Are you ready Lizzie?’ Richard asked offering his arm to his niece. Elizabeth looked past Teyla to her mother who stood waiting for the cue to step into the church; she couldn’t believe the overwhelming emotions that were running through her at that moment in time.

She nodded, afraid to speak or open her mouth for fear of bursting into tears or her vows slipping off her tongue and never returning. She was already married to him, how could she be so nervous, she had to remind herself that only those who had been on their mission with them two months ago, actually knew they were married, those and Teyla, Ronon and Radek.

Her mother disappeared through the doors of the church and Elizabeth made her way, heart thumping in her chest, past Teyla to stand ready. Teyla moved to help Heidi fuss with the vale, making sure it trailed down the bride’s back and along the floor before they both took their places, collecting their flowers from the tables on either side, Elizabeth eased the vale over her face, and waited.

The music started and Teyla could have sworn her heart skipped several beats. It had been an honour when Elizabeth had approached her to request not only she be her bridesmaid, but she be the maid of honour over her own cousin. She had been privileged with a trip to earth two months ago when this all began and spent four days with Elizabeth visiting various shops, and organisers meetings.

Helping with invitations, giving her opinion when requested on things like the cake, the colour of the bridesmaid’s dresses and even the dress Elizabeth now wore as they made their way slowly down the aisle. Teyla kept her eyes forward, as she was told to do, but took in the people around her as she passed.

Radek looked as though he had taken a great deal of time sorting his hair, having it trimmed and looking his best, Carson smiled brightly at her, beaming from the three beautiful woman being escorted past his eyes, several other members of the expedition lined the large hall, including Major Lorne and his team, a few technicians and scientists, the odd nurse and Doctor Heightmeyer, General’s O’Neill and Landry, Colonel Caldwell, the members of SG-1 and many, many people in uniforms Teyla had not met before.

Up front, the groom stood with his back to them, to his right, Ronon stood fiddling awkwardly with the suit he had been forced to wear, and Rodney stood prim and proper between them both, one hand in his pocket as he checked for the hundredth time that he’d remembered the rings.

John turned as Elizabeth drew near and Teyla was able to pin point the exact moment when his breath had caught in his chest, he was as stunned by her as Teyla had been moments ago, but he managed to mask the shock quickly and turned it into a smile.

Elizabeth stopped beside him, thanked her Uncle silently and turned to look lovingly at the man at her side.

‘Dearly beloved,’ the priest began and Teyla found herself oddly captivated by the words spoken, Earth ceremonies were vastly different from Athosian ones and she listened intently to the words the man facing them spoke. 

She moved to her seat when Heidi, who had been told Teyla had never been to a wedding before, edged her towards the pews, and watched happily as Elizabeth and John turned to each other, spoke their personal vows, which made Margret begin to sob, and place their rings on the others hand.

The ceremony ended with John kissing Elizabeth with so much gusto that the assembled friends and family turned their applause into cat calls and whistles.

A few hours later, after the Photographer had taken more pictures than were possibly needed, Teyla stood waiting by her chair in yet another vast hall with twice as many people around her than there had been at the actual wedding, to her right, Margret Weir waited expectantly, watching the milling crowd of strange people from all over the world; to her right, Ronon had returned to fiddling with his suit jacket, tugging at it as he attempted to get comfortable in the restrictive clothing.

‘These people have strange customs,’ He said, leaning in close to Teyla, as the Athosian looked past Elizabeth’s mother, past the two empty chairs and across to Richard, who was picking at a soft bun that sat on his side plate.

‘I do not know about you, but I am honoured to have been given the chance to see such a tradition.’ She whispered back, ‘I hear there are more that we will see before the end of the night, Kate tells me that after dinner, the first dance is done by Elizabeth and John, the cake will be cut by them at some point and before they leave for their honeymoon, Elizabeth will pass her flowers to another woman.’

‘That woman is expected to marry,’ Rodney added as he straightened his jacket; he had been walking past them to find his seat amongst the crowd.

‘I doubt it’ll be to you McKay,’ Ronon snorted back and Rodney looked slightly downcast before moving quickly away.

A cheer rose from the back of the room as Elizabeth and John arrived and began a slow passage from the door, to the head table, John having to shake hands with many people, Elizabeth to exchange kisses with many others and each having a small passing conversation or joke as they went.

They were beaming when they finally reached their seats, and Teyla briefly wondered if they had given in to a promise they had both kept. Teyla had learned the night before, that Elizabeth and John had slept separately since returning to Atlantis after the end of the Wraith, they had promised each other that they would hold off until they were at their honeymoon, then they would enjoy each other for the first time as a truly married couple.

The idea was romantic to Teyla, but she had learned through her time with these people, that it wasn’t a tradition and not many people actually did such a thing. She found this disheartening, but could not disagree with the other traditions she had learned of over the last two months.

As they took their seats and food was served, Teyla ran over the events, the preparations, vast and extensive and she had often paused to give Elizabeth’s shoulders a massage as she saw the tension of the day rising. The hen night, and the story of a party the men had taken to, both of which had taken place on Atlantis the day before leaving to return home.

Elizabeth hiding when John appeared at their hotel room door the previous night, Teyla had been confused but taken in the fact that Elizabeth did not want to be seen and had ushered John away quickly. It was shortly after that she had been told it was considered bad luck for the bride and groom to meet the night before.

The excitement and chaos of the morning, thankfully and expertly handled by Elizabeth’s mother, everything from Elizabeth’s shower, the introductions of Teyla to Heidi and then to Richard, she handled the decorators of the dinner hall they now sat in, she made sure the caterers were ready, the cake was done, the flowers were in place and everyone was dressed and in the right place at the right time; something Teyla was sure she would never have managed to do.

The ceremony itself, words spoken from one of Earths many religions, words spoken from the hearts of her dearest friends, and then witnessing the passionate embrace and kiss to seal their feelings. The signing of the register and certificate, photographs out in the light breeze to capture the memories of the day and then the hustle of people moving from the church to the dinner hall.

It was clear to the alien visiting this strange world and taking in the unusual culture, that a wedding, particularly in this case, was something to be cherished, especially if the feelings between bride and groom were pure. 

Dinner parted into dancing and as explained, Elizabeth and John had the privilege of the first steps. Teyla found herself gracing the floor on occasion, having been told that she was expected to at least dance with John once and then had been talked into the honour of dancing with Rodney, Carson, General O’Neill and Uncle Richard.

The happy couple disappeared for a few moments late in the evening and Teyla noticed the return of the limousine and took this to mean that John and Elizabeth would soon be leaving for their two week vacation on a cruise ship named Elizabeth.

‘Teyla,’ Kate called to her before she and Heidi descended on her and dragged her out into the reception area amongst hundreds of women, they pushed their way to the front and stood waiting.

‘What is happening?’ Teyla whispered to Kate making sure no one else would hear her.

‘Flower time, you have to catch the bouquet, Elizabeth will stand half way down the stairs and throw it over her shoulder,’ Kate explained, ‘if you catch it, it means you’ll be the next here to marry.’

As she finished a roar of cheers filled the room and Teyla looked up to see Elizabeth being escorted down the stairs by John, her flower arrangement in hand she had exchanged her pure white wedding gown for a light blue dress that clung to her figure all the way down to her thighs, and as she stopped and turned, Teyla caught sight of the garter belt she had on underneath.

The cheer turned quickly into a chanting pass of the word “throw” and Elizabeth peeked over her shoulder, winked at Teyla and then turned back to toss the flowers over her head and out into the crowd.

Unexpectedly, the flowers dropped heavily to the front of the group and Teyla instinctively reached out and caught hold of it.

‘Ronon,’ John shouted, having watched Teyla wrap her hands around the item, ‘you better watch out buddy, Teyla’s man hunting.’

She felt herself blush as Elizabeth turned, walked down the stairs and bowed her head to Teyla in the traditional Athosian friendship. Before she could pull away, she felt Elizabeth kiss her cheek and whisper, “stay clear of Rodney, he’s only here to see the pretty ladies.”

~~**~~

As John climbed into the car behind her, Elizabeth moved closer to him and wrapped her arms around him, she tilted her head back as he closed the door and as expected, he turned to her and kissed her gently.

‘My beautiful wife,’ he whispered as he ran his fingers down her cheek, ‘I want a picture of you, in the lovely dress in our room on Atlantis,’ he added before kissing her again, ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you that gorgeous before in my life, you were breathtaking,’ he kissed her again, ‘you are breathtaking.’

‘My wonderful husband,’ she whispered back, moving to rest her head on his shoulder and revel in the feel of his arms around her, ‘you can have anything you want, so long as you keep one promise.’

‘What’s that? That I come home after every mission?’ he kissed the top of her head and pulled her closer.

‘Well that too,’ she said before adding her part, ‘but I was thinking more along of the lines…’ she released him with one hand and moved her hand to the hem of her dress, ‘removing this,’ she hitched the dress up to reveal the bridal garter, ‘with your teeth when we get to our room.’

John slid his hand up her thigh to the lace garter and tucked his fingers underneath it.

‘Do I really have to wait that long?’ he questioned and kissed at her neck hungrily and feeling her moan vibrate through her throat as he did so.


End file.
